IRLF 


1 

_ 

'Q                -THE- 

-'-JOHN  -FF 
•CHINESE-  Ll 

IYER- 
BRARY  - 

WINDOWS  OF  CHARACTER 


AND   OTHER 


STUDIES   IN  SCIENCE   AND   ART. 


BY 

REV.  EDWARD  PAYSON  THWING,  M.D.,  Pn.D., 

L 

FELLOW  OF  THE  LONDON  SOCIETY  OF  SCIENCE,  LETTERS  AND 
ART,  MEMBER  OF  THE  BRITISH  MEDICAL  ASSOCIATION, 
VICTORIA    INSTITUTE,     NEW    YORK    ACADEMY 
OF    SCIENCES,     ACADEMY    OF    ANTHRO- 
POLOGY,  N.  Y.      MEDICO-LEGAL 
SOCIETY,     ETC.,     ETC., 


NEW  YORK  :  LONDON  : 

M.  L.  HOLBROOK  &  CO.  S.  W.  PARTRIDGE  &  CO. 


IOHN  FRYER 
CHINESE  LIBRARY 

TO 

SIR  JAMES  GRANT,  M.D.,  F.R.C.P.,  Lond.,  etc. 

IN  TOKEN  OF  HIS  PERSONAL  AND  PROFESSIONAL  \VQRTH, 

THIS  VOLUME  IS,    BY   HIS  FRIENDLY  PERMISSION, 

RESPECTFULLY  DEDICATED. 


The  artist  first  makes  his  study.  It  may  be  a  mere  outline  of  what 
he  is  to  paint,  a  fragment,  a  memory,  yet  full  of  suggestive  hints  for 
future  elaboration. 

These  papers  are  but  STUDIBS  in  Science,  Art  and  Character ; 
Thoughts  for  Thinkers.  They  outline,  rather  than  finish  ;  they  recall, 
suggest,  analyze.  The  synthesis  that  begins  with  careful  analysis,  ends 
in  a  system,  not  in  a  hypothesis.  If  abler  hands  find  helpful  data 
here,  the  author  will  be  amply  repaid. 

Citations  in  one  paper  may  perhaps  be  found  in  another.  These  are 
not,  however,  vain  repetitions.  References  to  local  circumstances 
made  in  the  original  addresses  are  preserved.  They  will  not  detract 
from  the  general  interest  of  the  themes  presented.  The  aim  of  the 
whole  has  been  to  verify  the  beautiful  figure  borrowed  from  the  ancient 
Athenian  torch  race, 
"WE,  SWIFT  RUNNERS,  PASS  FROM  HAND  TO  HAND  LIGHTED  TOUCHES. " 

To  the  thousands  who  have  honored  him  with  their  patient  hearing 
in  the  lecture  room,  the  college  or  the  church,  on  either  side  the  sea, 
these  silent  pages  give  again  his  grateful  greeting. 

6ia6i6oftsv 


751617 


CONTENTS* 


Page. 
WINDOWS  OF  CHAEACTER  ;  THE  VOICE,  THE  EYE,  THE  HAND, 

THE  STEP,  delivered  in  London,  1882.  -  9 

A  PERSUASIVE  VOICE  ;  London,  1883. 23 

PSYCHOLOGICAL  STUDIES  ;  Academy  of  Anthropology,  New 

York,  1888. 33 

MENTAL  AUTOMATISM  ;  A  Prize  Essay,  1888.  ...  49 
A  CLINICAL  AND  FORENSIC  STUDY  OF  TRANCE  ;  Medico-Legal 

Society,  New  York  1889. 73 

THE  BASIS  OF  REMEDIAL  SCIENCE,  an  Inaugural  Address,  New 

Jersey  Medical  College,  1889. 95 

THE  MYSTERY  AND  MASTERY  OF  MEN  ;  American  Institute  of 

Phrenology,  New  York  1884. 109 

THE  PERIL  OF  THE  CITY  ;  Manhattan  Association,  1889,  -  123 

AMERICAN  LIFE,  As  related  to  Inebriety,  London,  1888.  -  -  129 

VOCAL  AND  MUSICAL  CULTURE  IN  AMERICA,  London,  1888.  141 

THE  WORKS  OF  CANOVA,  a  University  Thesis.  -  -  -  -  149 


INDEX. 


Page. 
Academy  of  Anthropology.. 33,  48 

Agassiz,  unselfish 35 

Alcibiades  and  Socrates 44 

American  Nervousness 133 

Architecture  and  Elocution.  . .  145 

Asinine  Criticism 165 

Automat  ism 51 

Bayard  Taylor 135 

Beard,  Dr.  G.  M 72,  130 

Bells  of  Antwerp 24 

Bonaparte  and  Canova 152 

Canova  a  Reformer 163 

Character  like  a  Cathedral ....  10 

Church  Work  in  Cities 125 

Conversational  Power 44 

Cosmopolitan  America 137 

Criminal  Anthropology 101 

Crowded  Homes 124 

Deceptions  discovered 90 

Detectives  and  Trance 92 

Disguised  Artist 172 

Environment  68 

Erethism  of  Trance 83 

Erratic  and  Erotic  Feelings ...  116 

Experience  of  Agassiz 80 

Experts 70,  87,  88 

Eyes 12 

Fascination  of  Angelo 44 

Flaxman  and  Canova 154 

Forsyth  a  critic 150 

French  Revolution 128 

Garb  of  Statues 164 

Generosity  of  Canova 176 

Gentleness  a  Power ....  27,  32,  120 

Gesture  and  Character 18 

Greek  Architecture 40 

Handel's  Music 173 

Heaven  a  City 127 

Hurried  Lives 134 

Huxley  on  Science 50 

Hypnotism  and  Surgery 59 

Imagination   61,  107 

Indocility,  unscientific 67 

Insanity  in  the  U.  S 105,  139 

Intense  Study 136 

Involuntary  Life 73 

Jarves  on  Art 155 

Jarvis,  Dr.  W.  C 180 

Kindness,  a  Language 31 

Kinglinessof  Science 101 

Laboratories,  Psychological  . .  55 

Law  and  Psychology 76 


Page. 

Lecture  System 145 

Legal  Testimony 83 

London  Churches 125 

London  Society  of  Science  . . .  148 

Materialism  sterilizes 36 

Medical  Expert 87 

Mental  Therapeutics 106 

Mendelssohn  and  the  Opera. . .  179 

Methods  of  Canova 153,  175 

Metaphysics  defined 34 

Nancy,  Experiments  at 46 

Non-experts  a  peril 70 

Nude  in  Art 156,  169,  179 

Ocular  Illusions 84 

Oscar  WildQ 178 

Pantomime 17 

Personal  Equation 52,  97 

Personal  Magnetism.  ..43,  111,  115 

Pseudo-^Esthetics 177 

Psychic  Contagion 54 

Purity  in  Artists 174 

Remedy  for  Infidelity 47 

Roubiliac's  Methods 178 

Rhetoric  of  Persuasion 28 

Ruskin 156,  170 

Seasickness  cured 57 

Senses  untrustworthy 83 

Science  a  tacking  Ship 50 

Scientific  Candor 67 

Soul  an  Ocean 109 

Stars  in  Sparks 156 

Statues,  location,  material 159 

Suicide  in  Trance 94 

Sympathy,  rain  and  mist 41 

Temperaments 116 

Theology  and  Psychology 78 

Thermal  Changes 132 

Thought  Transference 64 

Tobacco  Heart 132 

Trance  explained 78 

Trance  Testimony  worthless . .  84 

Unconsciousness,  active 50 

Unity  of  Sciences 38 

Usurpation  of  Science  35 

Voice,  in  America 144 

Vulgarity  of  Americans 170 

Wandering  Imbecile 164 

Will,  free 68 

Will  of  the  Insane 68 

Wit  of  Erskine 118 

Youth  a  June  Morning 9 

Youthful  Dullards 45 


WINDOWS  OF  CHARACTER: 

THE  VOICE,  THE  EYE,  THE  HAND,  THE  STEP. 


It  is  a  joy  to  me,  this  bright,  June  morning,  to  talk 
to  you,  students  of  Euston  College,  about  Life  and 
Character,  their  silent  forces  and  their  grand  results. 
One  of  your  own  poets  has  said  that  life  is  a  casket, 
valuable  not  for  itself  alone,  but  for  what  you  put 
into  it.  Life  is  not  measured  by  years,  but  by  deeds. 
It  is  rich  and  royal,  grand  and  opulent  when  filled 
with  thought  and  effort,  love  and  labor,  aspiration, 
toil  and  victory  !  It  is  a  June  morning  with  you  all. 
It  is  early  autumn  with  me.  But  the  Alps  lead  to  the 
Appenines,  the  glacier  to  the  vineyard,  and  January 
leads  on  again  to  June.  Life's  autumn  and  winter 
bring  in  eternal  summer.  As  the  morning  is  the 
prophecy  of  noon,  so  is  youth  of  manhood  and  woman- 
hood. The  golden  gates  are  just  opened  to  you,  dear 
friends — the  doors  of  opportunity — but  soon,  as  with 
me,  they  will  begin  to  swing  the  other  way.  Be 


Delivered  at  Euston  College,  London,  Jnne  27,  1882. 


10  Windows  of  Character. 

earnest,  then,  to  make  the  most  of  life  and  its  mag. 
nificent  possibilities  !  Follow'the  advice  of  Holmes 
in  his  "  Nautilus  " :: — 

BUiid  thee  more  stately  mansions,  O  niy«oul, 

As  the  swift  seasons  roll ! 

Leave  thy  low  vaulted  past, 
Let  each  new  temple,  nobler  than  the  last, 
Shut  thee  from  Heaven  with  dome  more  vast, 

'Till  thou  at  length  art  free, 
Leaving  thine  outgrown  shell  by  life's  unresting  sea ! 

The  silent  forces  of  character  and  their  grand  re- 
sults, who  can  even  catalogue  them,  still  less  de- 
scribe ?  The  will,  the  conscience,  memory,  imagin- 
ation, the  judgment,  the  sensibilities  and  the  affec- 
tions— all  those  glorious  gifts  that  form  the  dowry 
of  each — richer  than  all  Victoria's  jewels,  how  I 
should  love  to  talk  to  you  about  their  place,  their 
possibilities,  and  their  discipline.  But  there  are, 
among  many  others,  four  indices  of  character  to 
which  I  wish  to  turn  your  thought :  the  Voice,  the 
Eye,  the  Hand,  the  Step.  We  will  call  them  "  Win- 
dows." 

Character,  like  an  illuminated  cathedral,  reveals 
itself  through  many  windows.  Some  men,  indeed, 
are  more  transparent  than  others.  The  distributive 
and  penetrating  power  of  personality  varies  with  in- 
dividuals. Some,  like  the  cathedral,  are  luminous 
with  commanding  beauty,  vocal  with  music,  and 
shed  an  atmosphere  of  warmth  and  fragrance  about 


The  Magnetic  Sphere.  11 

them.  The  savor  or  flavor  of  others  is  so  subtle  and 
elusive  that  you  can  not  at  first  detect  it.  The 
.  melody  of  some  shrinking  souls  is  so  quiet  that  you 
do  not  catch  it.  There  is  no  speech  or  language; 
their  voice  is  not  heard ;  yet  their  influence  goes  out 
through  all  the  earth,  and  their  words  to  the  end 
of  the  world.  Some  vainly  seek  to  veil  the  windows 
and  to  shut  in  the  incense  and  the  song.  They 
fancy  that  spirit  can  be  caged,  pent  in  by  bar  and 
bolt,  by  hasp  and  clasp  of  self-restraint  and  silence. 
But  it  is  impossible  for  one  to  thus  stand  guard  over 
himself  and  hide  the  revelation  of  his  inner  life. 
Character  is  self -revealing,  as  ointment  on  the  hand, 
Solomon  says,  betrays  itself.  Whether  we  will  or 
not,  this  spiritual  efflux,  call  it  character,  influence, 
deportment,  or  whatever  you  choose,  will  disclose  it- 
self. 

This  physical,  mental,  and  moral  atmosphere  we 
are  to  analyze  is  what  some  have  termed  "the  mag- 
netic sphere."  It  belongs  to  a  person  as  inevitably 
as  the  light  belongs  to  the  sun,  or  odorous  sweetness 
to  an  orange-grove. 

The  importance  of  understanding  all  that  goes  to 
make  up  one's  bearing  can  hardly  be  overestimated. 
To  old  or  young,  to  peer  or  peasant,  this  knowledge 
is  a  key  to  success  anywhere.  "  Prepare  yourself," 
says  Chesterfield,  "  for  the  world  as  the  athletes  used 
to  do  for  their  exercises ;  oil  your  mind  and  your 
manners,  to  give  them  the  necessary  suppleness  and 


12  Windows  of  Character. 

flexibility;  strength  alone  will  not  do."  Noble  man- 
ners are  not  bred  in  moments,  but  in  years,  as  Bishop 
Huntington  has  said.  They  come  "of  goodness,  of 
sincerity,  of  refinement.  The  principle  that  rules 
your  life  is  the  sure  posture-master."  The  bloom  on 
the  peach  and  the  golden  hue  on  the  corn  came  from 
maturity  within  and  not  through  human  art.  So  we 
can  get  out  of  life  and  character  no  more  than  we 
put  in.  The  external  refulgence  is  measured  by  the 
inward  illumination. 

The  Eye,  the  Voice,  the  Hand,  and  the  Step  are 
four  prominent  windows  out  of  which  designedly  or 
unconsciously  every  one's  personality  shines.  Win- 
dows vary  in  size  and  in  clearness,  and  so  with  these 
avenues  through  which  the  soul's  life  hourly  pours. 
The  principles,  however,  that  we  are  to  examine  re- 
main the  same  in  all  the  diversities  of  application. 

THE  HUMAN  EYE. — The  great  engineer  Stephenson 
was  once  asked  the  mightiest  power  in  nature,  and 
he  said  that  it  was  a  woman's  eye,  for  it  would  send  a 
man  to  the  ends  of  the  earth,  and  that  same  eye 
would  bring  him  home  again.  Some  eyes  are  so 
liquid  and  deep  that  Emerson  fitly  calls  them  "wells 
into  which  one  might  fall."  Others,  he  says,  have 
no  more  expression  than  blueberries.  Some  are  ask. 
ing  eyes,  some  assertive,  some  prowling,  some  full 
of  bayonets.  "  The  eyes  of  men  converse  as  much 
as  their  tongues,  with  the  advantage  that  the  ocular 
dialect  needs  no  dictionary,  but  is  understood  all  the 


The  Human  Eye.  13 

world  over.  Each  man  carries  in  his  eye  the  exact 
indication  of  his  rank  in  the  immense  scale  of  men, 
and  we  are  always  learning  to  read  it.  The  reason 
why  men  do  not  obey  us  is  because  they  see  the  mud 
at  the  bottom  of  our  eye." 

It  is  said  that  gamblers  rely  more  upon  the  expres- 
sion of  the  eye  of  their  opponent  to  discover  the  state 
of  the  game  than  upon  anything  else.  Bushnell  tells 
of  a  preacher  he  knew  whose  eyes  were  "  six-shoot- 
ers, "keen,  gray,  individualizing,  loaded  with  thought 
and  emotion,  and  leveled  directly  at  each  hearer  in 
turn.  There  was  no  special  merit  in  the  style  or  sub- 
stance of  his  speech,  but  his  penetrating  eye  made 
every  one  feel  that  eye-bolts  were  shooting  surely 
and  swiftly  into  the  very  soul.  Of  some  eyes  Shake- 
speare says : 

"  They  are  the  books,  the  arts,  the  academies 
That  show,  contain,  and  nourish  all  the  world." 

Tennyson  tells  of  other  eyes  that  are  "  Homes  of 
silent  prayer."  In  Eber's  "Egyptian  Princess,"  Sap- 
pho's lover  said,  "If  you  had  whispered  'I  hate  you  !' 
your  eyes  would  have  told  me  with  a  thousand  glad 
voices  that  you  loved  me." 

Brutes  are  kept  at  bay  by  the  eye.  The  tamer  and 
trainer  govern,  by  a  glance,  creatures  that  could 
easily  crush  them  did  they  know  their  power.  So  the 
human  eye  is  at  once  a  weapon  of  defense  and  assault 
cf  incomparable  strength.  "Next  to  the  voice  in 


14  Windows  of  Character. 

• 

effectiveness,"  says  Cicero,"  is  the  countenance,  and 
this  is  ruled  over  by  the  eyes."  In  Delsarte's  system 
there  are  seven  hundred  and  twenty-nine  expressions 
of  the  eye,  grouped  of  follows :  normal,  indifferent, 
morose,  somnolent,  contemptuous,  deeply  reflective, 
surprised,  and  resolute.  But,  as  in  music,  so  here, 
the  chromatic  scales  and  gamuts  of  expression  beg- 
gar all  description.  Darwin's  work  on  the  "  Expres- 
sion of  the  emotions  of  Men  and  Animals  "  is  a  help- 
ful treatise.* 

The  matter  of  facial  expression  is  a  copious  sub- 
ject, and  will  find  fuller  treatment  as  we  study  an- 
other of  the  avenues  through  which  one's  character 
and  personality  find  outlet,  the  voice. 

THE  VOICE. — This  is  regarded  by  many  as  the 
truest  index  of  character.  The  mouth  has  two  thou- 
sand one  hundred  and  eighty-seven  well-defined 
phases  of  expression,  thrice  those  of  the  speaking 
eye.  The  lips  are  "  curved  and  channeled  with  the 
memorials  of  a  thousand  thoughts  and  impulses."  In 
the  beautiful  phrase  which  Wordsworth  applied  to 
the  mountains,  it  may  be  said,  the  lips  "  look  familiar 
with  forgotten  years,"  recording,  as  they  do,  the  his- 
tory of  the  life  of  which  they  are  the  instrument  of 
expression.  Here,  however,  we  trench  on  the  domain 
of  Physiognomy.  It  is  the  voice  itself,  rather  than 


*  Vide  Thwing's   "Drill-Book  in  Vocal  Culture  and  Geg 
ture,"pp.  91-111. 


The  Voice.  15 

its  mechanism,  that  we  have  to  do  with.  This  is 
"the  key-stone  which  gives  stability  to  all  the  rest," 
says  Dr.  W.  M.  Taylor.  Effective  utterance  gives 
force  to  feeble  thought,  "  while  careless,  hesitating, 
and  indistinct  speech  will  make  the  finest  composi- 
tion fall  flat  and  powerless  on  the  listener's  e"ar."  It 
was  the  inward  life  that  gave  the  speech  of  Christ 
that  mysterious  power  it  had  over  men.  "Never 
man  spake  like  this  man,"  they  said.  As  Jerome 
says  of  Paul,  "  His  words  were  thunder,  because  his 
life  was  lightning." 

As  we  contrast  the  sparkle  of  the  eye  in  a  viva- 
cious, intelligent  youth,  with  the  vacant  stare  of  a 
microcephalous  idiot,  so  we  may  set  over  against 
each  other  the  indistinct,  muffled,  and  reluctant 
tones  of  a  person  who  is  shamming,  or  trying  to  con- 
ceal truth,  and  the  clear,  clean,  frank  tones  of  an- 
other who  speaks  with  the  emphasis  of  conviction. 

The  masterful  power  of  Mirabeau,  it  is  said,  was  in 
his  larnyx.  "  He  ruled  tumultuous  assemblies,  not 
by  the  lightning  of  his  thought,  but  by  the  thunder 
of  his  throat."  But  there  was  a  vehement  soul  beat- 
ing below  his  larynx  that  revealed  its  passionate 
emotion  in  tones  that  electrified  an  audience.  Speak- 
ing of  the  witchery  which  the  voices  of  certain  dra- 
matic artists  possess,  M.  Legouve,  of  the  French 
Academy,  says:  "It  seems  as  if  there  were  a  little 
sleeping  fairy  in  their  throat,  who  wakes  as  soon  as 
they  speak,  and,  touching  them  with  her  wand, 


16  Windows  of  Character. 

kindles  in  them  unknown  powers.  The  voice  is  an 
invisible  actor  concealed  in  the  actor,  a  mysterious 
reader  concealed  in  the  reader,  and  serves  as  a 
blower  for  both."  The  hidden  fairy  that  sleeps  in 
the  singer,  actor,  or  orator  is  Emotion.  Only  what  is 
in  the  soul  can  come  out  of  it.  As  Prof.  Mathew  s 
justly  observes:  "  The  magnetic  force  must  saturate 
one's  own  spirit  before  it  will  flow  out  upon  those 
around  him — an  invisible  efflux  of  personal  power 
which  radiates  like  heat  from  iron ;  which  attracts 
and  holds  an  audience  as  a  magnet  draws  and  holds 
steel-filings." 

A  lecturer  once  asked  a  hearer  at  the  close  of  the 
lecture:  "What  did  you  think  of  my  train  of 
thought?"  "It  lacked  only  one  thing."  "Pray 
what  was  that  ?"  "Your  train  only  needed  a  sleep- 
ing-car ! "  A  drowsy  heart  will  inspire  sleepy  tones, 
to  lull,  like  poppy-juice,  those  on  whom  they  fall ; 
whereas  an  electric  nature  makes  a  man  a  magician, 
like  Antiphon  at  Athens,  who  affirmed  that  he  could 
heal  mental  diseases  with  words,  or,  like  the  modern 
psychologist,  who  works  similar  marvels,  by  his  voice 
alone.  The  fiery  invectives  of  Burke  made  Warren 
Hastings  feel  for  the  time  that  he  was  "the  most 
culpable  being  on  earth."  Philip  of  Macedon  said  of 
Demosthenes:  "Had  I  been  there,  he  would  have 
persuaded  me  to  take  up  arms  against  myself." 

A  glowing,  ebullient  nature  not  only  sets  "logic  on 
fire,"  producing  what  is  called  eloquence,  but  often 


The  Hand.  17 

exerts  a  more  commanding  power  over  a  hearer. 
Mere  oratorical  eloquence  we  can  admire,  analyze, 
and  criticise,  but  with  a  magnetic  vocal  delivery  we 
are  spell-bound  in  spite  of  ourselves. 

THE  HAND. — This  furnishes  us  with  a  third  index. 
I  do  not  refer  to  the  assumptions  of  Palmistry  or 
Chiromancy,  that  is,  divination  by  the  hand.  In  the 
dark  ages  Paracelsus  and  others  elaborated  a  system 
by  which  they  pretended  to  find  out  one's  destiny  by 
examining  the  lineaments  of  the  hand.  Wandering 
gypsies  still  continue  the  imposition  among  the 
credulous  and  curious.  The  shape  and  texture  of  the 
hand  and  other  physical  features  do,  indeed,  reveal 
much  of  the  temper,  the  health  and  the  employments 
of  the  possessor,  but  it  is  rather  with  the  conscious 
and  unconscious  movements  of  the  hand  that  we  now 
have  concern. 

What  to  do  with  the  hands  is  a  difficult  question 
with  the  callow  youth  and  the  untrained  speaker. 
Their  self-consciousness  is  shown  by  this  form  of 
embarrassment.  As  character  is  matured,  some 
skill  at  concealment  is  gained,  but  after  all,  the  mo- 
tions of  the  hands,  taken  in  connection  with  other 
acts,  betray  feeling  and  purpose  to  one  who  has 
studied  their  signs. 

THE  PANTOMIME  is  a  vivid  illustration  of  the  power 
of  "pictures  in  the  air"  to  reveal  intention.  In  its 
rudest  form,  gesticulation  was  the  silent  language  of 
barbarians.  It  is  said  that  one  could  have  traveled 


18  Windows  of  Character. 

from  Hudson's  Bay,  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  centuries 
ago,  by  the  help  of  the  pantomime.  Only  six  of  150 
signs  used  by  the  Indians  of  that  day  need  explana- 
tion. The  oriental  "  winketh  with  his  eyes,  speaketh 
with  his  feet  and  teacheth  with  his  fingers."  Prov. 
vi.,  13.  Canova  once  held  a  silent  interview  with  a 
Neapolitan  by  hand  and  eye  alone.  These  quick  mo- 
tions of  the  hand  form  the  alphabet  of  mutes.  One 
of  them  will  tell  the  story  of  a  shipwreck,  for  ex- 
ample, so  that  an  intelligent  idea  is  gained  of  the 
thrilling  scene.  By  "the  talking  hand"  Greek  audi- 
ences were  held  hour  after  hour,  entranced  by  this 
form  of  mimetic  art.  The  general  use  to-day  of  pen 
and  type  has  made  us  poorer  in  certain  resources  of 
impressive  speech. 

CHARACTER  IN  GESTURE  is  revealed  in  much  the 
same  way  as  in  vocal  tones.  The  positive  man  uses 
a  vigorous  downward  motion,  as  he  uses  downward 
inflections  of  voice  in  strong,  assertive  utterances ; 
the  apologetic  person  uses  slower  and  less  forcible 
gesture,  as  he  speaks  in  quieter  tones.  The  glowing 
imagination  naturally  indulges  in  descriptive  gest- 
ures wider  in  range  than  those  which  accompany 
merely  didactic  speech.  Mobility  of  the  hand,  as  of 
the  mouth,  is  not  altogether  a  natural  gift. 

Culture  gives  wonderful  expressiveness,  not  only 
to  conscious,  but  to  involuntary  motions  of  the  hand, 
as  to  those  of  the  head.  Delsarte  says  that  an  edu- 
cated man,  wishing  to  look  at  an  object  on  either 


The  Step.  19 

side,  will  turn  first  his  eye,  then  his  head,  and  lastly, 
if  needful,  the  whole  body,  but  a  clown  turns  with 
one  motion  and  at  one  moment,  eye,  head  and  body. 
This  whole  matter  is  thus  connected  with  the  last 
point . 

THE  STEP. — Your  coach  is  a  deceptive  index  of 
your  true  condition  in  life,  but  by  your  "carriage" 
you  are  known  and  read  of  all  men.  It  is  more  than  a 
figure  of  speech  when  the  Bible  associates  character 
with  one's  "WALK  and  conversation,"  and  again, 
when  it  says,  "having  done  all,  stand."  "The  drill- 
master's  first  command  to  the  soldier  is,  "Stand 
well!"  The  apostle's  last  injunction  is  the  same. 
God's  special  blessing  is  on  the  upright.  Such  are 
likely  to  be  downright.  Positive  characters  and 
weak  ones  are  thus  distinguished.  The  reveler  reels, 
the  miser  stoops,  and  the  voluptuary  yawns,  but  the 
true  man  shows  his  inward  disposition  by  his  out- 
ward bearing.  He  stands,  not  as  the  pugilist  or 
fencer,  with  one  side  advanced,  as  in  a  hostile  ati- 
tude  to  give  or  to  take  a  blow,  but  cequo  pectore, 
uniting  self-possession  and  dignity  with  gentleness 
and  grace.  One's  manner  is  more  than  his  manners. 
The  latter  are  acquired  and  are  often  so  artificial 
that  we  call  them  mannerisms,  and  regard  them 
offensive.  But  one's  mien  or  air  is  inclusive  of  far 
more  than  those  arts  and  artifices  learned  in  the 
schools.  The  whole  outward  appearance,  including 
the  dress,  goes  to  make  up  this  atmosphere  which 


20  Windows  of  Character. 

one  carries  wherever  he  goes.  His  habits  make  his 
"  habit,"  the  garb  in  which,  and  by  which  he  is  known 
day  by  day,  a  " second  nature,"  as  we  say.  His  cus- 
tom becomes  a  costume,  which  he  rarely  lays  aside. 

As  Dry  den  says : 

"  The  habits  are  the  same 
We  wore  last  year." 

"  When  we  strive 

To  strip  them,  'tis  being  flayed  alive," 

adds  Cowper,  with  profound  truth. 

The  wiry,  nervous  man  moves  with  rapid  gait ;  the 
phlegmatic  man  with  heavy  step,  and  so  on  with  vari- 
ous temperaments.  Then  there  are  other  principles 
that  form  a  test,  illustrated,  for  instance,  in  the 
stealthy,  creeping  movements  of  the  thief,  the  halt- 
ing step  of  the  inquisitive,  or  the  aimless  walk  of  the 
day-dreamer.  "  I  know  that  man  has  been  a  soldier," 
said  one.  "  How  ?"  "I  know  it  by  his  walk."  He 
carried  the  trunk  and  shoulders  steady  and  firm, 
while  the  motion  of  walking  brought  into  action 
the  lower  limbs.  The  turning  in  of  the  toes  is  not  a 
favorable  sign.  Some  associate  it  with  mental  weak- 
ness. A  shuffling  gait  is  another  tell-tale  sign  of 
character.  But  to  go  into  details  would  require  a 
volume.  A  school  to  teach  youth  to  walk  has  been 
established  in  Philadelphia.  A  noble,  graceful  car- 
riage is  a  more  useful  accomplishment  than  dancing. 
If  shoemakers  will  only  help  the  teachers  of  such  a 


The  Eye.  21 

school  by  making  sensible  shoes,  there  might  be  hope 
of  seeing  here  the  graceful  step  one  notices  among 
the  humblest  Spanish  peasants.  But  art  will  never 
impart  the  polish  which  true  culture  gives.  It  is  the 
soul  within  that  illumines  the  face,  that  gives  a  per- 
suasive charm  to  the  voice  and  perfection  to  gesture 
and  to  step.  Here  ethics  and  aesthetics  unite.  It  is 
"by  his  personality,"  as  Goethe  says,  that  man  acts 
on  man.  If  one  wishes  to  charm  or  to  command  by 
either  of  these  functions  it  will  be  through  the  cul- 
ture of  the  moral  sensibilities,  largely.  By  such  a 
training,  a  person  will  come  to  wield  by  his  walk  and 
talk,  his  eye  and  his  unconscious  gestures,  a  power 
over  his  fellows  alike  masterful  and  beneficent. 
Pope  truly  says, 

u  WORTH  makes  the  Man,  and  want  of  it  the  fellow.    .   . 
'Tis  from  high  LIFE  high  Characters  are  drawn." 

This  is  a  daily  work.  As  Longfellow  saw  the 
village  smithy  toil  from  morn  to  night,  something 
attempted,  something  each  day  done,  so 

"  at  the  flaming  forge  of  life 
Our  fortunes  must  be  wrought ; 
Thus  on  its  sounding  anvil  shaped, 
Each  burning  deed  and  thought !  " 

Then,  fellow  students,  will  your  character,  like  the 
illuminated  cathedral,  full  of  light,  melody  and  in- 
cense, pour  out  the  same  from  every  window.  Your 
eyes  and  lips,  your  hands  and  feet  will  unconsciously 


22  Windows  of  Character. 

reveal  a  knightly  soul,  sweet,  radiant,  commanding. 
Again  I  congratulate  you  on  your  privileges  in 
this  college,  in  this  historic  city,  and  in  this  goodly 
land.  You  wear  the  scholar's  gown  and  cap.  Put 
on,  as  well,  the  true  manliness  of  the  scholar,  and 
let  your  lives  grow  richer  and  more  resplendent  as 
the  years  roll  by.  Then  will  your  earthly  studies  fit 
you  the  better  for  the  fellowships,  employments  and 
enjoyments  of  a  better  life. 

"We  bow  our  heads 

At  going  out.     We  rise  and  enter  straight 
Another  golden  chamber  of  the  King's, 
Larger  than  this  we  leave,  and  holier." 


A  PERSUASIVE  VOICE. 


There  are  various  voices  of  Nature.  Last  Tuesday 
I  spent  an  hour  of  restful  enjoyment  on  the  cliffs  at 
Eastbourne,  .overlooking  the  shining  waters  that 
divide  these  shores  from  France.  It  was  a  season  of 
serene  solitude,  undisturbed  by  foot  or  voice  of  man. 
Alone  with  nature  and  with  nature's  God,  I  learned 
lessons  that  I  could  not  learn  here  in  the  roar  of  Lon- 
don. JThe  bright  tranquility  of  earth  and  sky  and 
sea  lifted  my  thoughts  to  heaven's  crystal  sea.  The 
day  previous  brought  a  storm,  and  that  had  voices 
too. 

The  seasons  have  their  changeful  speech,  win- 
some and  austere  by  turns,  but  always  admon- 
itory. Youth  has  its  voice,  when  every  step  is  a 
bound,  and  every  breath  a  song ;  age,  too,  when  the 
daughters  of  music  are  brought  low.  Life  in  all  its 
phases  of  grief  and  joy,  at  home  and  in  lands  remote, 
has  its  voices.  The  closet,  the  sanctuary,  the  ceme- 
teryhave  theirs,  in  a  figurative  sense,  but  the  Human 


Delivered  July  29,  1883,  at  Tolmer's  Square  Church,  London. 


24  A  Persuasive  Voice. 

Voice  is  a  reality  more  potent  and  palpable  than  those 
already  named.  It  is  a  marvelous  weapon  of  assault, 
defence  or  persuasion.  It  has  a  capacity  for  improve- 
ment immeasurable.  In  song  and  speech,  in  prayer 
and  praise,  in  oratory  and  in  argument,  it  is  a  power 
of  which  we  have  but  a  feeble  conception.  Each 
of  these  "mouthfuls  of  air"  is  a  blessing  or  a  bane, 
for  life  and  death  are  in  the  keeping  of  the  tongue. 
More  august,  however,  than  human  speech  or  any  of 
the  voices  of  nature  was  the  "  Voice  from  the  excel- 
lent glory, "of  which  the  apostle  speaks— 2  Peter i.  17. 
It  is  not  earthly  or  angelic,  but  deific.  Yet  it  is  in- 
telligible, authoritative  and  consolatory.  This  celes- 
tial voice  loses  none  of  its  sweetness  and  purity  by 
coming  down  into  the  dissonance  of  a  noisier  sphere. 
Some  of  you  have  heard  the  famous  Antwerp  chime 
of  bells,  ninety  and  eight  of  them,  that  have  for  cen- 
turies been  ringing  through  storm  and  sunshine; 
now  a  marriage  peal,  now  a  funeral  knell ;  as  cheer, 
fully  when  Castilian  butchers  made  the  streets  run 
rod  with  martyrs'  blood,  as  when  they  announced 
the  birth  or  marriage  of  a  king.  No  matter  how 
dark  the  sky  or  thick  the  atmosphere  through  which 
their  pulsations  throb,  high,  airy,  distant,  their  har- 
monies are  daily  wafted  down  amid  the  jarring  dis- 
cords of  the  street  to  cheer  and  quicken  the  heart 
with  thought  of  a  better  sphere.  So  does  this  voice 
out  of  the  cloud,  heard  by  the  disciples  on  "a  high 
mountain  apart,"  which  issued  not  from  a  human 


The  Heavenly  Voice.  25 

source,  but  from  the  "excellent  glory"  of  Heaven, 
teach  us  of  God's  unspeakable  Gift  and  quicken  us 
with  its  supernal  sweetness. 

"  This  is  my  beloved  Son  in  whom  I  am  well 
pleased."  This  certification  of  the  character  and  cre- 
dentials of  Christ  is  an  authoritative  message.  Let 
him  that  hath  ears,  hear  and  heed.  It  is  an  impera- 
tive call,  coming  from  One  who  has  the  right  to  com- 
mand. How  shall  we  escape,  if  we  turn  away  from 
Him  who  speaketh  from  Heaven  ?  To  reject  this  call 
is  to  reject  life,  The  gift  of  God  is  Eternal  Life,  and 
this  life  is  found  alone  in  Christ.  Hear  ye  HIM  ! 

But  this  celestial  call  is  one  of  consolation.  It 
comes  from  Him  who  is  the  center  and  source  of 
peace.  In  the  world,  our  Lord  says,  we  shall  have 
tribulation.  In  Him  we  have  peace.  Earth  is  full  of 
care.  It  was  not  made  to  give  us  abiding  rest.  Its 
atmosphere  is  full  of  sighs.  Science  tells  us  that  the 
bulk  of  nature's  voices  are  pitched  on  the  minor  key. 
The  winds  sob,  the  waves  moan  and  the  voice  of  many 
a  beast  and  bird  have  the  tone  of  complaint  and  un- 
rest. But  this  is  a  voice  of  peace. 

Moreover,  there  is  continuing  and  unwasting  sweet- 
ness in  this  voice  from  the  upper  realm.  The  story 
and  the  glory  of  God's  grace  continue  through  the 
ages  heard  above  earth's  riot,  more  heavenly  and 
jubilant  than  Antwerp's  ancient  chime.  It  is  the 
"Old,  old  story"  which  is  forever  new.  When  all 
other  earthly  voices  die  away  upon  the  ear,  this  will 


26  A  Persuasive  Voice. 

abide  in  undecaying  purity  and  power,  for  it  is  the 
voice  of  the  King  Eternal,  the  same  yesterday,  to-day 
and  forever. 

These  and  many  other  thoughts  suggested  by  the 
phrase  quoted  might  be  dwelt  upon  at  length.  There 
is  one  practical  lesson,  however,  which  winners  of 
souls  may  well  heed.  The  manner  in  which  we  pre- 
sent Christ  to  men  has  much  to  do  with  our  success. 
The  tone  in  which  we  say  ' '  Behold  the  Lamb  of  God 
who  taketh  away  the  sin  of  the  world  ; "  the  method 
of  approach  to  the  indifferent  or  hardened  hearer ; 
the  attitude  we  take  in  meeting  the  inquiring,  the  de- 
spairing or  the  shrinking  soul,  will  win  or  alienate  as 
we  follow,  or  as  we  forget,  the  example  given  in  this 
voice  from  the  excellent  glory.  The  teacher  or 
preacher  who  would  persuade  men,  must  speak  the 
truth  in  love,  cultivating  at  once  a  tender  compas- 
sion for  sinning  souls  lying  under  the  thrall  of  Satan 
and  a  loyal,  loving  sympathy  with  Jesus,  to  whose 
almighty  grace  it  is  our  glad  employ  to  bring  them. 
John  Newton  wrote  this  text  in  large  characters  on 
his  study  walls  at  Olney:  "Remember  that  thou  wast 
a  bondman  in  the  land  of  Egypt,  and  the  Lord  thy 
God  redeemed  thee."  Gentleness  is  often  power  in 
repose.  It  is  the  beauty  which  should  ever  be  wed- 
ded to  strength.  It  is  "  the  scented  flame  of  an  ala- 
baster lamp,  yielding  both  light,  warmth  and  fra- 
grance. It  is  the  tenderness  of  feeling,  the  glow  of 
love;  it  is  promptitude  of  sympathy,  everything  in- 


Austerity  of  Speech.  %7 

eluded  in  that  matchless  grace,  the  gentleness  of 
Christ." 

There  is,  indeed,  a  time  for  martial  virtues  and  for 
valiant  words.  There  is  a  stormy  eloquence  befitting 
stormy  times,  that  reminds  one  of  the  hurricane 
which  nothing  can  divert  or  control.  Demosthenes 
took  his  audiences  by  storm.  His  arguments  and 
appeals  marched  forward  like  invincible  squadrons, 
crushing  everything  in  their  way — violent  and  venge- 
ful, coercive  and  peremptory.  There  are  those  who 
uniformly  adopt  a  style  of  speech  that  is  minatory 
and  defiant,  autocratic  and  triumphant.  Their  only 
aim  seems  to  be  to  demolish  their  opponents.  Their 
model  is  Phocion,  whose  power  of  argument  was  that 
of  a  falling  ax,  which  flew  swift,  sure  and  with  re- 
lentless energy.  One  dreads  to  fall  under  their 
merciless  logic,  feeling,  as  Whately  says  the  Romans 
did,  who  would  often  hold  out  in  a  hopeless  siege  a 
longer  time  because  they  dreaded  the  humiliation  of 
passing  under  the  yoke.  Personally,  these  imperious 
speakers  may  be  the  most  genial  of  men.  Their 
austere,  rigorous  and  Draconian  style  of  argument  is 
only  a  rhetorical  dress.  They  disclaim  the  slightest 
ruffle  of  personal  resentment  toward  their  antagonist. 
They  never  dream  that  the  habit  of  their  mind  has 
affected  their  style  of  composition,  and  that,  in  turn, 
has  made  their  voice  sterner,  more  dictatorial,  and 
sometimes  objugatory.  It  does  not  come  from  "the 
excellent  glory."  I  heard  one  of  these  preachers  who 


28  A  Persuasive  Voice. 

presented  the  usual  arguments  for  future  punish, 
ment,  ending  each  division  of  the  discourse  in  a  tone 
of  triumphant  satisfaction.  His  arguments  were  co- 
gent and  conclusive,  but  his  tone  inspired  disgust, 
and  so  disbelief.  He  imitated  JEschylus,  who  cried: 
"Blood  for  blood  and  blow  for  blow  ! "  The  power  of 
gentleness  was  wholly  unrecognized  in  his  rhetoric, 
logic  and  vocal  delivery.  How  can  we  preach  on  such 
an  appalling  theme  otherwise  than  in  tears?  "Of 
whom  I  now  tell  you,  weeping  " — was  Paul's  expres- 
sion of  sympathy.  A  parent  that  chides  or  corrects 
his  child  in  a  cold,  unfeeling  manner,  with  no  pity  in 
his  eye,  no  tremor  in  voice  or  hand,  hardens  him.  The 
child  himself  is  defenceless  and  weak.  He  submits 
outwardly  but  nurses  rebellion  within.  A  single  tear 
would  have  melted  the  icy  obstinacy  and  brought  the 
cringing  culprit  to  his  knees  in  sorrowing  repent- 
ance. O  for  that  insight  of  love,  to  which  all  hearts 
capitulate !  Pre-eminently  does  the  public  speaker 
need  it.  It  helps  him  in  the  composition  of  his  dis- 
course. It  enriches  his  vocabulary  with  those  con- 
ciliatory utterances  which  disarm  opposition,  and 
makes  his  most  unpremediated  speech  like  ointment 
poured  forth.  By  not  a  whit  does  he  need  to  lower 
the  stringent  and  compulsory  nature  of  truth,  but  his 
phrases  are  so  formed  and  adjusted  that  he  conquers 
by  new  modes  of  assault.  Quibbling,  sophistry,  eva- 
sion, cant,  subterfuge  in  his  opponent,  are  met,  not 
by  sarcasm,  which  only  exasperates,  or  by  scorn,  but 


Conciliatory  Methods.  29 

by  a  quietude  of  manner  which  veils,  oftentimes  a 
tremendous  amount  of  reserved  strength,  by  a  sin- 
cere candid  spirit  of  concession,  which  often  half- 
persuades  the  objector  to  yield  all,  and  by  a  frank,  in- 
genuous manliness  that  challenges  fairness  in  an 
antagonist. 

There  are  nameless  and  numberless  arts  of  per- 
suasion that  lurk  in  language,  in  facial  expression 
and  in  gesture  itself,  which  no  winner  of  souls  can 
afford  to  despise.  Nearly  thirty  years  of  preach- 
ing, and  many  years  of  public  and  private  teaching, 
only  have  impressed  me  with  my  own  poverty  in  the 
resources  of  persuasion.  The  drift  away  from  the 
sanctuary  in  many  communities  is  a  fact  to  be  in- 
terpreted in  the  light  of  this  question  of  persuasive 
speech.  When  shall  we  learn  that  the  "  gentleness" 
of  God  makes  one  great  ?  Its  conquering  power  is 
yet  to  be  learned.  Without  omitting  the  preceptive 
and  assertive — the  dogmatic  style,  if  you  please — may 
we  not  gain  reluctant  ears  of tener  by  the  interro- 
gative form  of  appeal  ?  Christ  often  accomplished 
more  by  indirections  than  by  direct  assault.  He  was 
a  master  of  persuasive  speech.  He  did  not  confine 
himself  to  declarative  forms,  but  continually  made 
the  hearer  a  judge  in  his  own  case.  "  What  do  you 
think  of  this  ?  What  would  you  say  of  that  ?  Isn't 
it  thus  and  so  ? "  Without  a  parable  he  spake  not 
unto  them.  He  knew  how  to  awaken  curiosity.  He 
disarmed  opposition  by  the  tone  of  his  voice  which 


30  A  Persuasive  Voice. 

was  like  ointment  poured  forth,  and  by  the  phrases 
used.  His  thoughts  were  "  apples  of  gold,"  while  his 
speech  was  like  ''baskets  of  silver."  Men  wondered 
at  the  gracious  words  that  proceeded  out  of  his  lips. 

* '  Do  you  write  for  the  Ear  as  well  as  for  the  Eye  ?  " 
a  student  once  asked  me.  "  Certainly,"  was  the 
answer,  "it  is  the  charm  of  written  composition  to 
express  oneself  so  naturally  in  structure  and  in  tone 
that  a  blind  person  listening  would  not  suspect  the 
presence  of  a  manuscript.  If  one  writes  with  an  audi- 
ence of  living  souls  before  his  thought,  his  sentences 
will  not  be  long  and  involved.  They  will  be  colloquial 
and  euphonious,  easy  to  read  and  easy  to  remember. 
This  alluring  subject  will,  however,  lead  us  too  far 
from  the  central  thought  that  underlies  this  analysis 
of  vocal  delivery  and  written  speech,  namely  Heart 
Culture.  As  I  have  said  in  my  Drill-Book  in  Vocal 
Culture,  "Art  can  give  us  rules, but  the  fervor,  solem- 
nity and  power  that  move  the  conscience  and  the 
will,  must  be  the  natural  and  not  the  assumed  expres- 
sion of  the  man." 

There  is  no  teacher  like  the  Holy  Spirit.  He  in- 
spires not  only  spiritual  but  real  rhetorical  power. 
With  his  annointing  oil  on  our  lips  and  the  salt  of  his 
grace  in  our  speech,  we  shall  speak  as  from  the  ex- 
cellent glory.  The  weary  will  be  cheered,  the  wan- 
derer restored,  the  caviller  silenced  and  the  hungry 
soul  will  be  fed.  Daniel  Webster's  voice  was  called 
a  trumpet,  but  Channing's  was  a  harp  of  matchless 


The  Secret  of  Power.  31 

sweetness.  A  skeptic  once  complained  to  Dr.  Chaii- 
ning  of  the  severity  of  Christ's  denunciation  of  the 
Pharisees.  The  man  of  God  read  the  passage  in 
tones  so  calm,  solemn  and  sympathetic  that  the  dis- 
believer exclaimed :  "If  He  spoke  that  way,  my  ob- 
jection is  withdrawn.''  The  trumpet  has  its  place. 
So  has  the  harp.  Strength  and  beauty  are  in  the 
sanctuary,  and  they  both  alike  adorn  a  symmetrical 
life.  Self-mastery  is  indispensible  to  the  mastery  of 
others.  In  "the  very  torrent  and  tempest''  of 
eloquence,  there  is,  as  Shakespeare  suggests,  "a 
temperance  that  may  give  it  smoothness."  The 
calmness  of  suppressed  emotion  is  mightier  than  th'3 
frantic  expressions  of  uncontrolled  passion.  Mark 
Antony,  stifling  his  sorrow,  concealing  his  grief, 
begged  the  Romans  to  bear  with  him  till  his  heart, 
coffined  with  CaBsar,  should  come  back  to  him. 
Thus  the  imagination  is  called  into  play  and  the 
smothered  feeling  really  gains  in  intensity. 

Genuine  sympathy  and  kindness  of  heart  will  be 
revealed  in  written  and  spoken  words.  Theophilus 
Trinal  says  of  winsome  words: 

"  LOVE  in  the  writing  peeps  and  hides 
Like  stars  in  twilight  air." 

Love  sweetens  speech  as  mellow  chimes  and  bal- 
samic odors  fill  the  encircling  air  with  sweetness. 
Thus  heart  and  voice,  pen  and  tongue,  together  cre- 
ate a  power  persuasive  and  masterful.  "Kindness 
is  a  language  which  the  dumb  can  speak,  and  which 


32  A  Persuasive  Voice. 

the  deaf  can  understand."  Men  cannot  be  scolded 
into  the  love  of  truth,  or  dragooned  into  its  service. 
As  Maclaren  says:  "Gentleness  is  mightiest.  We 
best  adorn  the  doctrine  of  God  our  Saviour  when  we 
go  among  men  with  the  light  caught  in  the  inner 
sanctuary  still  irradiating  our  faces,  and  our  hands 
full  of  blessings.  We  are  to  be  soldier-priests,  strong 
and  gentle,  like  the  ideal  of  those  knights  of  old  who 
were  both,  and  who  bore  the  cross  on  shield,  helmet 
and  sword-hilt." 

Such  a  bearing  the  true  philosophy  of  persuasion 
teaches  us  to  cultivate.  It  is  rational,  for  "The 
most  profound  conceptions  of  truth,"  says  Professor 
Phelps,  "  tend  always  to  a  state  of  repose.  The  in- 
terest they  excite  is  the  interest  of  equalized  sensi- 
bilities. In  such  a  state  of  Christian  culture  there  is 
a  remote  resemblance  to  the  serenity  of  the  mind  of 
God.  Well  do  painters  represent  Christ  as  gestur- 
ing with  the  open  palm,  or  with  the  monitory  finger 
pointing  skyward.  Who  believes  that  He  ever  pound- 
ed the  desk  or  stamped  His  foot  in  Divine  anger,  or 
rivaled  the  bulls  of  Bashan  in  His  intonations  ?  Do 
we  not  think  rather  of  His  low  and  solemn  tones, 
His  sitting  posture,  His  stooping  form,  His  still  or 
tremulous  hand  and  His  melting  eye."  The  more  we 
are  with  Christ  the  more  shall  we  gain  this  soul- 
winning  power;  then  will  men  see  that  we  have  been 
with  Jesus  and  have  learned  of  Him. 


PSYCHOLOGICAL    STUDIES 

THEIR   SCOPE  AND   UTILITY. 


Delivered  at  the  opening1  of  a  course  of  fortnightly  lectures,  under  the 
direction  of  the  ACADEMY  OF  ANTHROPOLOGY,  at  Cooper  Union,  New  York 
City,  October  9th,  1888. 


An  enthusiastic  German  philosopher  has  said, 
"He  touches  heaven  who  lays  his  hand  upon  a 
human  frame."  True,  for  it  is  fearfully  and  won- 
derfully made.  But  he  draws  very  near  to  God  who 
wisely  lays  a  guiding  hand  upon  a  human  soul;  who 
can  detect,  evoke,  control  and  use  aright  the  powers 
of  its  endless  life  ! 

It  will  be  my  aim  briefly  to  define  the  significance 
and  use  of  that  branch  of  our  studies  which  the  Acad- 
emy has  properly  placed  first  in  its  curriculum. 
Psychology,  the  science  of  the  human  soul,  is  a 
better  term  than  Metaphysics,  or  Mental  Philoso- 
phy, which  refers  rather  to  the  cognitive,  intellec- 
tual functions.  Though  the  term  Psychology  is  not 
three  hundred  years  old,  the  study  is  not  new. 
Popularly  speaking,  the  soul  includes  both  the  prin- 
ciple of  life  and  of  intelligence.  In  stricter  lan- 
guage the  soul  is  the  sentient  and  the  spirit  is  the 


34      Scope  and  Utility  of  Psychological  Studies. 

higher,  rational  principle.  A  pure  spirit  is.ont3  that 
never  was  incorporate;  but  we  are  souls  and  have 
bodies.  We  are,  however,  more  interested  in  the 
phenomena  of  consciousness  than  in  its  essence ; 
more  in  empirical  or  experimental  Psychology  than 
in  rational  Psychology,  which  involves  one  in  end- 
less philosophical  speculations. 

Anthropology  treats  of  man,  body  and  soul,  that 
is,  of  Somatology — his  structure  and  functions, 
Anatomy  and  Physiolgy— and  Psychology.  We 
study  the  body  through  the  senses,  but  the  mind, 
as  manifested  by  consciousness. 

Psychology  is  well  called  the  highest  court,  for  it 
defines  conscience  and  duty.  It  thus  links  itself  to 
Ethics,  Law,  Theology  and  Political  Economy.  So 
far  as  it  gives  canons  of  taste  it  is  related  to  ^Esthet- 
ics. Yet  Logic  has  been  called  its  lawgiver  and 
Metaphysics  its  voucher,  for  the  one  prescribes  the 
rules  of  right  thinking,  and  the  other  presents  the 
primitive  grounds  of  being  itself.  The  frivolous 
subtleties  of  schoolmen  brought  Metaphysics  into 
contempt,  and  even  now  one  is  ready  to  admit  that 
the  blacksmith  of  Glamis  was  not  far  out  of  the  way 
in  saying  that  a  discussion  may  be  called  metaphy- 
sical where  the  listeners  "disnaken  what  he  that's 
speakin'  means,  and  he  that's  speakin'  disna  ken 
what  he  means  himsel'." 

Psychology,  like  all  other  inductive  sciences  of 
nature,  is  a  science  of  observation,  persistent,  con- 


The  Usurpation  of  Physical  Science.  35 

tinuous  and  comprehensive.  Professor  Porter,  in  his 
"Elements  of  Intellectual  Science,"  shows  the  great 
value  of  its  study  as  related  to  self-knowledge,  moral 
discipline  and  success  in  life.  The  education  of  the 
sensibilities,  the  art  of  conversation,  the  pedagogic 
and  homiletic  science,  sociology,  jurisprudence, 
theology  and  medicine  are  all  illuminated  by  Psy- 
chology. 

This  is  a  scientific  age,  but  as  Dr.  R.  D.  Hitchcock 
says,  "Science  is  inordinately  physical  instead  of 
metaphysical.  It  staggers  under  its  burden  of  facts, 
and"  is  frequently  mistaking  its  own  unproven  hy- 
potheses for  laws."  Nor  is  it  strange  that  physical 
science  usurps  the  place  of  the  spiritual  when  we 
remember  the  domination  of  the  senses  over  the 
noble  powers  of  man ;  when  we  also  remember  the 
pecuniary  rewards  which  are  had  in  turning  thought 
niid  labor  to  material  things,  and  the  temptation  to 
subordinate  science  to  popular  opinion,  or  to  make 
merchandise  of  scientific  opinions.  Professor  Louis 
Agassiz  once  said  that  he  was  "  never  a  quarter  of  a 
dollar  ahead  in  the  world,  and  never  expected  to 
be."  When  offered  a  large  sum  to  go  to  a  distance 
and  lecture  he  replied,  "I  cannot  afford  to  waste 
my  time  in  making  money."  He  was  always  look- 
ing through  mere  things  up  to  ideas,  up  to  the  Maker 
of  all.  He  said  that  "the  ignoring  of  God  will  end 
in  making  natural  science  itself  sterile." 

Over  the  doors  of  the  Academy  where  Plato  taught 


36      Scope  and  Utility  of  Psychological  Studies. 

were  placed  the  words,  "Let  no  one  unacquainted 
with  geometry  enter  here."  It  is  not  mathematical 
inaptitude  that  bars  the  way  to  the  lecture  room  or 
laboratory  to-day,  but  it  is  that  frigid  and  sterilizing 
materialism  which  dwarfs  the  soul  by  its  deceptive 
and  degrading  conceptions,  and  drowns  its  outcry 
with  a  chilling  creed. 

"  A  scientist  who  lives  without  God  in  the  world," 
said  the  illustrious  scholar  just  quoted,  "seems  to 
me  to  be  worse  off  than  ordinary  men.  I  never 
make  preparations  for  penetrating  into  some  small 
province  of  Nature  hitherto  undiscovered  without 
breathing  a  prayer  to  the  Being  who  hides  His 
secrets  from  me  only  to  allure  me  graciously  on  to 
the  unfolding  of  them." 

We  must  also  discriminate  between  science  and 
sciolism,  between  the  substantial  and  the  specious 
and  pretentious.  "A  little  knowledge  is  a  danger- 
ous thing"  if  it  breeds  conceit.  Too  many  self- 
satisfied  explorers  write  their  "Ne  plus  ultra"  over 
the  little  boundaries  of  their  own  knowledge,  as  did 
Spain  at  the  gates  of  Hercules.  They  refuse  to  see 
"more  beyond."  A  truly  scientific  spirit  is  calm, 
candid,  cautious,  exacting  and  yet  hospitable  to 
all  truth.  It  is  as  free  from  indociiity  and  per- 
verseness  as  it  is  from  credulity,  remembering  that 
now  we  know  in  part,  and  prophesy  in  part,  and 
that  to-day  is  but  the  cradle  of  to-morrow. 

Having  thus  shown  some  reasons  why  physical 


Unity  of  the  Sciences.  3? 

science  has  often  usurped  the  place  of  higher 
studies,  we  may  briefly  note  the  ground  of  their 
unity,  and  thus  show  that,  so  far  from,  antagoniz- 
ing each  other,  they  are  mutually  helpful.  This 
unity  is  a  unity  of  origin,  method  and  aim.  Matter 
and  mind  come  from  one  origin.  The  spiritual 
ground  of  existence  is  an  undeniable  fact.  It  is 
needless  to  argue  this  here.  In  God  all  things  con- 
sist, stand  together.  "  Matter,  pressed  to  the  utmost, 
declares  itself  to  be  force.  Force,  pressed  to  the 
utmost,  declares  itself  to  be  Thought  and  Will. 
Thought  and  Will,  pressed  to  the  utmost,  declare 
that  they  are  the  breath  of  the  Spirit  of  God.  The 
Alpha  and  Omega  of  human  experience  is  Spirit. 
At  the  end  of  all  our  science,  at  the  summit  of  all 
our  philosophy  we  stand  to-day  where,  in  the  dim 
antiquity  of  an  almost  prehistoric  age,  one  stood  in 
the  Spirit  of  the  Lord  and  said,  "  In  the  beginning 
God  created  the  heaven  and  the  earth." 

Science  measures  thermal  changes  to  the  eighty- 
eight  one  hundredth  of  a  degree,  and  the  size  of 
atoms  to  the  hundred  thousandth  of  an  inch  ;  but  it  is 
well  said,  "  On  the  other  side  of  the  atoms  is  God. 
Beyond  the  last  conceivable  subdivision  of  matter 
is  the  One  substance,  the  continuous,  indivisible, 
omnipotent,  spiritual  ground  of  existence,  the  Liv- 
ing God."  Spectroscope,  microscope,  galvanoscope, 
delicate  as  are  their  adjustments,  are  insufficient  in- 
terpreters of  the  mysteries  of  being.  We  must, 


38      Scope  and  Utility  of  Psychological  Studies. 

with  the  "Microcosm  of  Lotze,"  build  on  the  postu- 
late of  a  spiritual  cause. 

Again,  there  is  a  unity  in  method.  The  plan  of 
the  Creator  of  physical  and  psychic  forces  is  a  con- 
structive, orderly  and  progressive  plan.  There  is 
continuity  in  the  evolution  of  life,  whether  in  the 
flowers  of  the  field  or  in  the  brain  of  the  botanist 
that  studies  them.  Sensible  and  supersensible  pro- 
cesses in  each  are  under  law,  are  parts  of  a  definite 
system,  orderly,  rational  and  open  to  intelligent 
eyes.  The  growth  of  a  plant,  the  formation  of  a  crys- 
tal, or  the  grander  growth  of  memory,  will  and  con- 
science are  alike  regular,  methodic,  progressive,  so 
that  normal  and  abnormal  phenomena  may  be  de- 
tected and  classified. 

Nature  is  not  chaos  but  cosmos.  There  is  preci- 
sion, harmony  and  balance  in  her  work.  Tyndall 
says  that  not  a  particle  of  vapor  is  lifted  without 
being  paid  for  in  solar  heat.  Gain  involves  its 
equivalent  expenditure,  everywhere,  every  time. 
Nothing  is  gratuitous,  haphazard.  The  great  lesson 
of  Science  to  us  is,  says  Emerson,  "  That  the  history 
of  nature,  from  first  to  last,  is  incessant  advance 
from  less  to  more,  from  rude  to  finer  organization  ; 
the  globe  of  matter  thus  conspiring  with  the  princi- 
ple of  undying  hope  in  man." 

This  is  the  third  feature  of  unity,  that  of  aim  and 
purpose.  The  science  of  things  and  of  thoughts,  of 
matter  and  of  mind,  of  monads  and  of  men,  proceeds 


Nature  the  Priestess  of  Heaven.  39 

from  one  Teacher,  and  they  have  one  end.  The 
material  is  the  silent  teacher  of  the  spiritual.  Nat- 
ure is  not  only  the  servant  of  our  coarser  needs,  but 
the  minister  to  our  higher  wants.  "  Giving  us 
bread  to  eat,  water  to  drink,  raiment  to  put  on,  air 
to  breathe  and  soil  to  stand  on  and  build  on,  nature 
might  have  been  clothed  with  homely,  russet  gar- 
ments, girded  for  toil;  but  as  the  priestess  of 
heaven,  ministering  in  the  holy  place,  appealing 
to  the  higher  faculties  of  man,  she  is  clothed  like 
Aaron,  with  temple  vestments,  and  Solomon  with 
all  his  glory,  is  not  arrayed  like  her.  Her  forms 
are  evanescent ;  but  her  ministry  is  everlasting. 
Her  grass  withereth,  and  her  flower  fadeth;  but 
the  word  of  the  Lord  that  speaketh  through  her, 
endureth  for  ever."  It  is  spiritual  law  in  the  natur- 
al world,  as  Hugh  Macmillan  shows  in  'k  The  Min- 
istry of  Nature." 

Professor  Drummond  has  unwittingly  inverted 
the  order  in  the  title  of  his  work.  It  is  quite  true 
that  the  supernatural  is  not  unnatural,  but  it  is  also 
true  that  for  spiritual  ends  this  material  crea- 
tion stands.  Nature  should  not  be  regarded  as  un 
spiritual,  but  as  a  parable  of  moral  truth.  There  is 
a  law  of  correspondencies  between  physical  and 
psychic  facts,  higher  and  nobler  than  Swedenborg 
ever  dreamed  of,  or  Bishop  Butler  ever  outlined. 
Men  of  keen  spiritual  tastes,  like  Agassiz,  feel  this 
quickening  truth.  He  once  remarked,  "My  ex- 


40      Scope  and  Utility  of  Psychological  Studies. 

perience  in  prolonged  scientific  investigations  con- 
vinces me  that  a  belief  in  God,  a  God  who  is  behind 
and  within  the  chaos  of  ungeneralized  facts,  beyond 
the  present  vanishing  points  of  human  knowledge, 
adds  a  wonderful  stimulus  to  the  man  who  attempts 
to  penetrate  into  the  regions  of  the  unknown." 
Speaking  of  him,  Whipple  says,  "  His  soul  flamed 
out  in  every  expression  of  his  magnificent  nature, 
conveying  the  impression  of  intense,  superabundant 
life.  He  told  me  that  he  had  never  known  a  dull 
hour  in  his  whole  life.  To  be  ten  minutes  in  his 
company  was  to  obtain  the  strongest  argument  for 
the  immortality  of  the  soul." 

"  Recent  discoveries  in  Greek  architecture,"  says 
Professor  Phelps,  "  are  said  to  prove  that  the  lines 
of  certain  fluted  columns,  always  till  now  regarded 
parallel  and  vertical,  are  really  convergent,  and 
would  meet  if  continued  upward."  This  illustrates 
the  unity  of  the  aspirations  of  great  souls  among 
themselves,  and  the  converging  approach  of  all  such 
lives  to  the  supreme  and  unifying  center  of  all  truth 
above.  It  is  in  God  our  Saviour,  by  whom  the 
worlds  were  made,  that  the  partial  views  we  hold, 
the  dim  ideals  sought,  all  blend  and  are  realized  in 
symmetrical  unity.  He  is  the  Truth.  To  see  Him 
as  He  is,  is  to  focus  in  one  center  the  scattered 
gleams  of  truth  we  elsewhere  gain. 

Having  thus  glanced  at  the  method  and  spirit  of 
our  studies  let  us  look  at  their  practical  value  in  a 


The  Education  of  the  Sensibilities.  41 

few  particulars.  The  education  of  the  sensibilities 
has  been  alluded  to.  Human  emotion  is  a  factor  of 
immense  power.  It  is  a  subordinate  but  invaluable 
ally  in  the  art  of  persuasion.  To  understand  the 
laws  of  influence  and  to  be  able  to  utilize  them  in 
the  mastery  of  men  is  an  exhilerating  possession. 
The  power  of  Circe  with  her  magic  wand  is  sur- 
passed by  that  wondrous  witchery  which  he  wields 
who  can  arouse,  restrain  and  guide  emotion  at  will, 
causing  another  soul  to  capitulate  at  his  pleasure,  all 
unconscious  of  the  thrall  thrown  over  it.  This  is 
illustrated  in  public  speech.  It  is  well  to  have  our 
feet  on  facts  and  to  handle  arguments  like  arrows  ; 
but  after  all,  persuasion  does  not  come  through 
intellectual  processes  merely  or  mainly.  There  is 
what  Professor  Phelps  calls  "a  conglomerate  of 
thought  and  feeling,  spiritual  power  and  animal! 
magnetism."  There  is  a  mutual  sympathy  gener- 
ated between  the  true  orator  and  his  audience. 
"  He  gives  back  to  them  in  rain  what  he  receives  in 
mist,"  to  use  the  figure  of  Gladstone.  It  is  the  pro- 
vince of  Psychology  to  teach  one  to  discriminate, 
identify  and  use  these  psychic  forces  that  are  de- 
veloped in  the  play  of  human  sensibilities.  Other- 
wise there  will  be  a  waste.  The  chemist  gives  me  a 
pinch  of  powder  and  a  few  drops  of  liquid.  I  fling 
the  fluid  to  the  floor  and  blow  the  feathery  dust  from 
my  fingers.  They  are  gone.  But  wed  them  and  I 
have  an  electric  battery.  Thought  travels  over  the 


42      Scope  and  Utility  of  Psychological  Studies. 

wire.  So  he  who  can  unite  and  control  these  deli- 
cate,  elusive  yet  mighty  elements  of  spiritual  life  is 
a  master  of  men.  We  hang  crystal  tuhes  in  our  hall 
ways.  They  answer  to  every  breath  of  heat  and  cold. 
Stone  and  iron  respond  to  the  sunshine.  The  rain 
drop  on  the  window  pane  records  itself  in  the  flame 
of  the  evening  lamp.  But  with  more  phenomenal 
delicacy  do  human  sensibilities  reveal  themselves 
by  furtive  movements,  unintended  but  irrepressive 
symbols  which  the  skilled  diagnostician  of  mind 
reads  as  readily  as  does  the  physician  in  the  work  of 
physical  diagnosis.  The  color  of  the  eye,  the  curva- 
ture of  a  vein,  the  fibriliary  tremor  of  a  muscle,  the 
voice,  breath,  odor  and  a  score  of  other  unconscious 
revelations  teach  the  medical  man  what  he  might 
not  learn  by  direct  questioning  of  his  patient.  So 
with  the  subtle  influences  of  the  soul.*  Few,  in- 
deed, appreciate  the  affluent  resources  of  power 
found  in  our  emotional  life.  It  is  one  of  the  practi- 
cal advantages  of  this  study  that  one  comes  to  know 
the  contents  of  his  own  being  and  the  laws  which 
control  the  commerce  which  his  soul  holds  with 
others.  We  speak  of  magnetic  men.  Why  ?  Be- 
cause a  magnet  draws  and  holds.  It  has  something 
to  give.  The  steel  is  made  to  receive.  As  with 
metals  so  with  men.  There  is  a  hidden  potentiality, 
and  it  rests  in  part  upon  a  physiological  basis.  He 
who  expects  to  put  forth  power  must  have  a  pleni- 

*  Vide  "The  Windows  of  Character." 


The  Genesis  of  Personal  Magetism.  43 

tude  of  power  at  hand.  This  is  not  muscular  energy 
or  physical  health  merely.  An  ox  is  healthy,  but  he 
is  as  stolid  as  he  is  strong,  for  certain  functions  have 
been  arrested.  A  man  may  be  stalwart  and  sinewy, 
yet  sodden  and  passionless,  with  little  fiery  or  erup- 
tive life.  Like  the  Duchess  of  Marlborough,  he 
may  have  been  born  before  nerves  were  invented. 
He  is  a  metal  man,  but  not  a  man  of  mettle  !  How 
can  he  master  men  of  vehement,  palpitating  sensi- 
bilities ?  I  have  elsewhere  referred  to  the  vital  unity 
between  intellectual  and  sexual  energy,  and  how,  as 
Mandsley  illustrates,  the  finest  poetic  and  artistic 
emotion,  as  well  as  the  essence  of  religion  and  mor- 
ality stand  related  to  the  development  and  control 
of  the  reproductive  system.  These  lower,  animal 
sensibilities  are  to  be  treated  something  as  were 
Abraham's  domestics,  "  circumcised  and  made  serv- 
ants." The  chisel  of  Praxiteles,  the  counsels  of  Peri- 
cles, the  eloquence  of  Demosthenes  are  truly  seen 
and  appreciated  when  viewed  in  their  relation  to 
Phryne,  Aspasia  and  Lais.* 

There  is  also  in  the  man  of  magnetic  sensibilities 
the  powers  of  elimination  and  of  restraint.  He  may 
find  himself  in  contact  with  a  responsive  soul,  and 
can  exhale  the  fullness  of  that  " atmosphere"  which 
is  peculiarly  his  own.  The  conjunction  of  an  afflu- 
ent, distributive  nature  with  a  sensitive,  receptive 

*  Homiletic  Monthly,  June,  1884,  "Pulpit  Magnetism.* 


44      Scope  and  Utility  of  Psychological  Studies. 

one  produces  marvelous  effects.  The  efflux  of  soul 
is  partly  automatic  and  partly  volitional.  It  is  easy 
to  feel,  but  hard  to  analyze  it ;  a  radiation  as  real  as 
heat  from  fire,  and  which  constitutes  the  indivi- 
dual's "air."  It  is  partly  a  gift,  but  quite  as  much 
a  growth.  It  is  a  polarization  that  touches  certain 
souls  and  draws  them  like  doves  to  their  windows. 

Conversation  is  a  field  for  the  play  of  these  nsychic 
forces.  There  are  men  who  not  only  entrance  their 
hearers  when  they  teach  in  the  lecture  room,  sing 
on  the  stage  or  preach  in  the  pulpit,  but  in  the  street 
and  parlor  hook  others  to  them  as  with  claws  of 
steel.  Time  is  annihilated,  engagements  forgotten, 
and  discomfort,  even,  swallowed  up  by  the  charm  of 
their  discourse.  Alcibiades  was  held  as  by  a  mes- 
meric spell  at  the  feet  of  Socrates.  The  warrior 
bowed  to  the  philosopher.  "When  I  listen  to  him 
my  heart  beats  and  tears  come  to  my  eyes.  I  am 
more  roused  by  far  than  are  the  revelers  in  the  rites 
of  Cybele.  I  see  that  it  is  so  with  every  one  else. 
Therefore,  stopping  my  ears,  as  if  to  shut  out  the 
voice  of  Sirens,  I  tear  myself  away  by  force  lest  I 
grow  old,  sitting  by  his  side."  So  did  the  fascination 
of  Michael  Angelo's  speech  hold  as  with  fetters 
D'Ollanda,  sent  to  Rome  by  the  King  of  Portugal, 
"  He  awakened  such  a  feeling  of  faithful  love  in  me, 
that  if  I  met  him  in  the  papal  palace  or  in  the  street, 
the  stars  would  often  come  out  in  the  sky  before 
I  let  him  go  again."  The  attraction  is  mutual. 


Psychology  and  Pedagogy.  45 

Friendship  is  mental  gravitation,  and  not  to  be  re- 
sisted any  more  than  the  earth's.  It  comes  of  neces- 
sity rather  than  of  choice.  The  fountain  before 
the  Lateran  in  Rome  at  Rienzi's  election  as  tribune 
gushed  with  both  red  wine  and  white.  So  the  com- 
manding and  the  consenting  soul  are  one  in  this  out- 
flow of  spiritual  wealth,  the  real  wine  of  life. 

The  rhetorical,  homiletic  and  histrionic  elements 
of  this  personal  power  are  manifest  and  manifold. 
The  tongue  of  the  talker  is  reinforced  by  facial  ex- 
pression, and  the  entire  sermo  corporis  which  cannot 
be  located  in  any  member,  but  speaks  with  swift 
,and  certain  emphasis,  creating,  in  fact,  a  man's 
atmosphere  which  envelops  him,  and  which  is  all 
the  more  significant  because  an  inexpressible,  in- 
separable and  unconscious  efflux.  The  philosophy 
of  gentleness  as  a  power,  and  the  phonetic  as  well 
as  rhetorical  features  of  persuasion  could  easily  be 
here  developed  into  a  chapter,*  but  the  aim  of  this 
lecture  is  but  to  suggest  thought,  and  not  to  elabor- 
ate it. 

Psychology  and  pedagogy  are  vitally  related. 
The  eager  and  inquisitive  French  mind  has  been 
quick  to  utilize  in  this  line  certain  psychic  exper-i 
merits,  as  in  the  training  of  dullards,  for  example. 
Seguin,  at  Paris,  since  his  death  his  widow  in  this 
city,  and  the  educators  at  Elmira  Reformatory,  have 
reported  marvelous  results  in  physical  and  mental 

Homiletio  Monthly,  February  1882.     "Persuasive  Speech." 


46      Scope  and  Utility  of  Psychological  Studies. 

renovation.  The  speech,  gait  and  facial  expression 
are  improved  immediately.  But  still  more  wonder- 
ful are  the  moral  transformations  reported  by  Dr. 
Liebault  at  Nancy,  among  the  poorest  and  most  de- 
praved whom  he  and  his  colleagues  have  treated 
by  psychological  experiments  that  cannot  here  be 
described  in  detail.  Victims  of  drink,  opium  and 
tobacco  are  inspired  with  a  permanent  disgust  of 
the  vices  which  have  enslaved  them.  Abandoned 
females,  obscene  in  speech,  incorrigible  in  evil  ways, 
have  become  virtuous  and  respected.  Some  of  them 
have  taken  and  held  for  years  positions  of  trust. 
The  transactions  of  the  French  Association  for  the 
Advancement  of  Science,  held  at  Nancy  in  1886,  and 
the  reports  of  Professors .  Berillioii  and  Augustin 
Voisin,  at  the  Salpetriere  and  elsewhere,  suggest 
the  immense  power  for  good  in  psycho-therapeutics. 
The  relations  of  these  studies  to  medicine,  to  sur- 
gery, to  the  care  of  the  sick  and  insane,  to  many 
questions  in  civil  and  criminal  law  have  been  con- 
sidered in  my  papers  presented  to  this  Academy,  and 
to  the  Medico  Legal  Society.  The  field  of  heredity, 
of  sociology,  indeed  of  all  remedial  science,  is  cleared 
up  by  a  knowledge  of  Psychology.  Here  we  have, 
as  Dr.  Beard  observed,  a  key  to  half  the  world's  delu- 
sions and  the  scientific  basis  of  those  occult  phenom 
ena  that  have  ever  been  at  once  the  wonder,  the 
terror,  and  the  joy  of  men.  Religious  truths  which 
familiarity  has  monotonized  become  august  and  au- 


Religious  Bearings  of  the  Theme.  47 

thoritative,  and  invested  with  reality  and  signifi- 
cance. Theological  questions  like  the  study  of 
miracles,  demoniacal  possessions,  the  biblical 
trance,  death  and  immortality  are  also  illuminated 
by  the  light  which  these  investigations  shed  on 
them.  As  physiological  chemistry  has  revolution- 
ized old  systems  of  pathology,  as  modern  astronomy 
has  rewritten  solar  physics,  may  we  not  believe  that 
the  practical  study  of  the  principles  of  Psychological 
science,  now  so  general  throughout  the  thinking 
world,  will  bring  to  light  newer  and  truer  concep- 
tions of  man's  nature  and  needs,  and  introduce  a 
philosophy  of  human  life  more  intelligent,  compre- 
hensive, humane  and  Christian  than  has  yet  prevailed? 
James  Martin  eau  voiced  the  heart-cry  of  an  un- 
numbered multitude  when  he  said  "  The  only  true 
remedy  for  the  dark  infidelity  and  cold  materialism 
that  threaten  the  utter  destruction  of  the  religious 
life  in  a  large  portion  of  the  people  is  to  give  them  a 
living  faith,  true  to  the  conscience,  true  to  the  intel 

lect,    TRUE    TO    THE    REALIZED    SCIENCE    OF   THE    DAY.'> 

Towards  the  fulfillment  of  this  hope,  the  studies  of 
this  Academy,  the  course  of  free  fortnightly  lectures 
begun  with  this,  our  papers,  debates  and  publications 
point.  We  have  twenty-five  hundred  years  of  phil- 
osophy behind  us,  but  we  remember  that  the  soul  of 
man  is  a  serial  publication.  Human  life  appears  in 
parts,  chapters,  paragraphs,  even.  The  world's 
drama  is  coming  to  its  close.  "  Time's  noblest  off- 


4:8      Scope  and  Utility  of  Psychological  Studies. 

spring  is  its  last!"  The  present  is  full  of  stimulat- 
ing possibilities,  and  the  future,  of  inspiring 
promise.  We  are,  as  was  said  at  the  outset,  to  be 
observant,  cautious,  candid,  thorough,  never  mis- 
taking unproven  hypotheses  for  laws,  sciolism  for 
science,  the  specious  for  the  substantial ;  but  avoid 
alike  the  extreme  of  credulity  on  the  one  hand,  and 
that  of  indocility  and  self  conceit  on  the  other. 
Moreover,  we  are. not  a  guild  of  Agnostics,  but  have, 
from  the  start,  recognized  the  spiritual  ground  of 
existence ;  the  unity  of  origin,  method  and  aim  in  all 
the  sensible  and  supersensible  processes  of  nature. 
Behind  matter  is  power  ;  behind  power,  will ;  behind 
will  is  Spirit,  personal,  indivisible,  ubiquitous,  eter- 
nal !  As  the  lines  of  fluted  columns  in  Greek  sculp 
ture  meet,  and  as  the  tunneling  lines  of  Alpine 
engineers  converge  to  one  point,  so  find  we  there  in 
God,  the  unifying  center  of  truth,  the  summit  of  all 
our  philosophy  and  the  realization  of  all  our  hopes. 


MENTAL  AUTOMATISM. 


This  paper  received  the  Academy  Prize  of  fifty  dollars,  and  was  read  be- 
fore the  International  Congress,  called  by  the  Academy  of  Anthropology, 
at  Columbia  College,  New  York  City,  June  1888. 


It  will  be  the  aim  of  this  paper  to  illustrate  certain 
forms  of  unconscious  mental  action,  and  to  show  the 
scientific  and  ethical  value  of  this  department  of 
Anthropological  study. 

The  chief  fact  in  human  existence  is  the  Involun- 
tary Life,  according  to  an  eminent  psychologist. 
"Consciousness  appears  to  be  but  a  helpless  spec- 
tator of  a  minute  fraction  of  a  huge  amount  of 
automatic  brain-work."  The  latter  is  compared  by 
Francis  Galton  to  the  ocean  with  its  millions  of 
waves ;  the  former  is  a  single  line  of  breaking  surf 
along  the  shore.  "The  unconscious  operations  of 
the  mind  frequently  far  transcend  the  conscious 
•Ones  in  intellectual  importance.  I  begin  to  think 
that  my  best  brain-work  is  wholly  independent  of 
consciousness. " 

It  would  be  irrelevant  to  enter  here  upon  the  meta- 
physical and  scientific  speculations  on  the  origin 


50  Mental  Automatism. 

and  essence  of  thought  and  the  unity  of  physical 
and  psychic  action,  "the  conflict  literature'5  as  Zoch- 
ler  terms  it,  for  physicists  and.  philosophers  alike 
confess  their  inability  to  solve  these  problems. 
Shadworth  Hodgson  thinks  that  it  is  time  that  Sci- 
ence was  heard,  for  "The  present  position  of  Phil- 
osophy is  not  only  a  scandal  to  the  intellectual  world, 
but  fraught  with  danger  to  the  best  interests  of 
humanity."  But  Professor  Huxley  candidly  admits 
that  the  advance  of  Science  is  slow  and  circuitous, 
"  That  of  a  tacking  ship,  the  resultant  of  divergencies 
from  the  straight  course.'' (1)  Says  another,  "We 
must  recognize  our  limitations  with  reverent  agnosti- 
cism, the  folly  and  futility  of  further  investigations. 
In  the  vast  land  of  unconsciousness,  intellectual  ac- 
tivity becomes  manifold,  and  each  of  the  many  sides 
of  our  nature,  untrammelled  by  the  restraints  of  con- 
scious volition,  carries  on  a  ceaseless  activity,  the 
results  of  which  we  sometimes  receive  and  recognize 
in  consciousness. "<2) 

Though  by-gone  mental  experiences  and  acquisi- 
tions are  hourly  fading  into  forgetfulness,  they  are 
imperishable.  "  Physical  processes  are  complete  in 
themselves  and  would  go  on  just  as  they  do,  if  con- 
sciousness were  not  at  all  implicated.  .  .  .  The 
problem  of  the  connection  of  the  body  and  soul  is  as 
insoluble  in  its  modern  form  as  it  was  in  the  pre- 
scientific  ages."(3)  With  this  declaration  of  Tyn- 
dall  we  may  rest  the  case.  It  would  be  a  waste  of 


Terms  Defined.  51 

time  to  discuss  the  materialism  of  early  philosophers, 
or  tho  guarded  materialism  of  Professor  Bain,  his 
"  double-faced  unity  of  matter  and  spirit ;"    or  "  the 
convex  and  concave  sides  of  one  indentical  curve,"  as 
Lewes  suggests,  for  either  must  be  the  property  of 
the  other,   or  else   a  third  something  exists.     We 
simply  know  that  "  Soul  is  a  conscious  unity  which 
materialism  has  failed  to  comprehend,  and  this  is  a 
firmer  fact  than  even  the  existence  of  the  material 
universe.      The  established  unity  of  physical  and 
psychic   forces,  however,  as  now  understood,  is  in 
advance  of  the  dualism  of  Liebnitz  and  Descartes.*' 
The  soul  needs  an  incarnation  in  its   pupilage  and 
the  body  needs  a  soul  for  its  own  perfection.     The 
harmony  is  not  one  of  mere  "mechanical  adjust- 
ment, but  of  two  gr.owths  from  the  same  spiritual 
and  divine  source.     The  spirit  has  not  been  impris- 
oned in  matter,  as^a  woman  with  her  child  was  walled 
in  by  the  masons  of  Magdeburg,  who  built  up  around 
her  the  walls  of  the  city,  but  our  souls  have  air  and 
life  from  the  great  world  without. "  (i) 

TERMS  DEFINED. — At  the  outset  we  are  to  distin- 
guish between  natural  and  educated  automatism, 
instinct  and  habit.  The  latter  is  predicated  of  that 
unconscious  cerebration  which  is  the  product  of  re- 
petitious thought  and  effort  in  certain  lines  and 
grooves.  Prof.  Wundte  has  shown  <5>  by  labratory 
experiments  that  there  is  a  measurable  interval  be- 
tween sensory  nerve  impressions  on  the  brain,  a 


5%  Mental  Automatism. 

purely  physical  process,  and  the  mental  action 
through  the  attention  and  will.  The  processes  are 
not  identical,  synchronous  or  co-extensive.  Delicate 
tests  show  this  interval  to  be  from  one-tenth  to  a 
quarter  of  a  second.  This  makes  that  personal  equa- 
tion which  is  so  important  to  ascertain  in  every  indi- 
vidual in  order  to  eliminate  error.  Astronomers 
understand  this  primary,  congenital  condition.  An 
observer,  for  example,  is  to  note  the  instant  that  a 
star  touches  the  wire  stretched  across  the  field  of  a 
telescope.  He  counts  the  beats  of  the  clock  and  notes 
the  beat  at  which  the  transit  occurs.  A  number  of 
observers  are  tested,  and  a  variation  of  half  a  second, 
according  to  W.  M.  Williams,  is  noticed  between  the 
records  made,  which  represents  the  variation  in 
auditory  perception  and  alertness  of  volition,  hence 
the  length  of  time  required  for  a  sensory  impression 
to  reach  the  brain  and  for  the  response  to  be  trans- 
mitted outward  to  the  muscles.  Not  only  do  indi- 
viduals differ  among  themselves,  according  to  age, 
sex,  temperament,  and  in  observatories  are  rated 
and  registered  accordingly,  but  the  personal  equation 
of  each  observer  requires  periodic  revision  as  much 
as  do  watches  and  chronometers. 

Just  here  an  ethical  fact  asserts  its  presence,  the 
determining  power  of  the  will,  as  related  to  spon- 
taneous and  automatic  activity.  While  the  will  may 
not  originate  mental  activity,  it  may  select,  utilize 
and  improve,  and  thus  dominate,  automatic  tend- 


Ambulatory  Thinkers.  53 

encies.  Intensity  of  attention  is  in  inverse  ratio  to 
extensity.  Here  is  a  hint  at  mental  discipline  and 
moral  growth,  which  is  of  highest  importance. 

2.  Another  preliminary  consideration  is    this,  we 
are  to  differentiate  ordinary,  normal   action   from 
aberrant,  pathological  conditions,  or  those  forms  of 
the  Involuntary  Life  which  are  artificially  induced 
for  scientific  study,  as  hypnosis,  and  sleep-walking. 

3.  We  may  admit  with  Spier,   that  there  is   an 
Ante-Chamber  of  consciousness,  "a  general  environ- 
ment of  nervous  activity,  where  the  recognition  of 
the  Ego  is  partial  and  indistinct.    Ambulatory  think- 
ers illustrate   this   half-conscious    condition,  as  did 
Stuart  Mill,   who  thought  out  a  good  part  of  his. 
"System  of  Logic,    during  his  daily  walks  between 
Kensington  and  the  India  House.-     So  deeply  ab- 
sorbed was  he  that  he  did  not  recognize  the  friends 
he  saw,  yet  he  avoided  every  vehicle  and  obstruc- 
tion, in  obedience  to  the  lower  centers  which  con- 
trolled muscular  motion,  while  the  higher  centers  of 
the  nervous  mechanism  were  busy  with  ideation. 

A  reporter  of  night  debates  informed  an  acquaint- 
ance of  mine  that  he  had  repeatedly  fallen  asleep 
through  sheer  fatigue,  yet,  rousing  himself,  would 
find  that  he  had  continued  to  note  down  correctly 
the  speaker's  words.  He  added  that  this  was  not 
an  uncommon  experience  among  his  associate  re- 
porters in  the  House  of  Commons. 

In  this  connection  we  do  well  to  keep  in  mind  the 


54  Mental  Automatism. 

distinction  between,  yet  the  unity  of,  the  Sympa- 
thetic system,  which  has  control  of  our  organic  life, 
and  the  Cerebro-Spinal,  which  rules  our  animal  life. 
Carpenter  says  that  the  motor  endowments  of  the 
former  are  chiefly  dependent  upon  its  connection 
with  the  latter,  through  the  nerve  fibres  that  enter 
the  sympathetic  plexuses  ;  also  that  in  disease  the 
sensory  endowments  possessed  by  parts  supplied  by 
the  Sympathetic  system,  unrecognized  in  health, 
cause  a  radiation  in  impulses  and  morbid  sympathies 
between  remote  organs.  There  is  also  an  exalta- 
tion of  the  autonomy  of  the  spinal  cord,  simultane- 
ously with  neural  suspension  of  cerebral  influence. 
There  is  an  increase  of  what  Brown  Sequard  calls 
"  dynamogenic  processes,"  a  force  producing  or  force 
transforming  action  in  one  group  of  nerve  cells,  and 
an  inhibition  of  another  sphere  or  group,  through 
Expectation  and  Attention. 

Striking  illustrations  of  this  occur  in  the  study  of 
psychic  contagion,  where  audiences  are  enraptured 
by  song  or  speech,  "their  breath  sucked  out  by  the 
spongy  eloquence  of  some  cunning  orator,"  as  Dr.  O. 
"W.  Holmes  pictured  Helen  Darley,  till  they  fairly 
heave  and  gasp  for  air.  Madame  de  Sevigne's  ac- 
count of  Bourdaloue,  Prof.  Frazer's  description  of 
Chalmers,  and  Dr.  Croly's  portraiture  of  Pitt,  record 
the  same  results  following  the  unconscious  tension 
to  which  attention  subjects  one  part,  and  the  inhibi- 
tion of  another  part  of  the  nervous  mechanism. 


Psychological  Laboratories.  55 

We  owe  much  to  Lotze,  Fechner  and  Helmholtz, 
but  even  more  to  Prof.  Wundt  for  the  establishment 
of  Psychological  Laboratories.  The  first  was  begun 
in  1879,  at  Leipsic.  The  University  furnished  rooms, 
apparatus  and  a  salaried  demonstrator.  Students 
from  America,  Russia  and  other  distant  countries 
are  working  in  chapters  or  groups.  One  in  each  sec- 
tion acts  as  registrar  of  data.  Psychometry,  the 
measurement  of  mental  processes,  is  the  leading 
study,  related  as  it  is  to  molecular  changes  in  the 
brain  and  variations  in  personal  consciousness.  Be- 
sides this,  elaborate  and  conscientious  methods  are 
used  to  determine  the  kinship  of  the  psychic  state 
and  the  physical  stimulus.  This  branch  is  called 
Psycho-physics.  It  is  founded  on  the  constant  and 
indivisible  interactions  of  the  forces  of  these  distinct 
yet  inseparable  spheres.  It  assumes  that  perception, 
comparison,  memory,  consciousness  are  as  real  and 
potential  in  their  realm,  as  heat  and  electricity  are 
in  their  own.  The  use  of  the  word  "  Laboratory  "  in 
this  connection  is  a  declaration  of  this  fact.  The  old 
definition,  "a  place  for  chemical  investigations," 
must  go.  Mind  is  more  than  matter.  Conscience 
and  will  are  more  than  quiverings  of  brain-jelly,  and 
the  intercourse  of  souls  is  a  grander  study  than  that 
of  electricity.  With  Tennyson  we  say — 

"  Star  to  star  vibrates  light.     Can  soul  to  soul 
Strike  through  a  finer  element  than  its  own  ?  " 


56  Mental  Automatism 

It  is  time  to  pass  to  another  field  of  illustrations  of 
the  Unconscious  Life.  We  have  glanced  at  the 
primitive,  instinctive,  spontaneous  automatism  of 
mind,  and  also  at  the  secondary  or  educated  auto- 
matism which  is  the  result  of  habit  and  training. 
We  now  consider  abnormal  mental  automatism. 

ARTIFICIAL,  AUTOMATISM. — The  supreme  expression 
of  the  Involuntary  Life  is  the  Trance.  This  compre- 
hensive term  covers  ten  or  fifteen  varieties,  but  the 
hypnotic  form  is  the  only  one  from  which  illustra- 
tions will  now  be  drawn.  Artificial  sleep-walking 
has  been  termed  "  artificial  insanity,"  and  properly 
considered  as  a  study  in  Mental  Pathology.  Its  defi- 
nition, methods  of  induction  and  control  have  been 
elsewhere  described  and  need  not  here  be  repeat- 
ed. <6>  From  one  hundred  and  forty  different  cases, 
some  original  data  have  been  obtained,  and  the  veri- 
fication of  many  observations  and  deductions  of 
other  experimenters. 

MEDICAL  AND  HUMANE  ASPECTS. — My  attention 
was  directed  to  various  forms  of  artificial  uncon- 
sciousness, soon  after  beginning  to  read  Medicine,  in 
1852.  A  follower  of  Braid,  who  lectured  extensively 
in  America,  offered  to  teach  me  the  art  of  inducing 
the  Trance  state.  Frequent  voyages  to  foreign 
countries  the  last  ten  years  have  brought  me  into 
contact  with  sufferers  from  sea-sickness.  Believing 
this  to  be,  primarily,  a  cerebral  disturbance  and  not  a 
gastric,  it  occurred  to  me  that  hypnosis  would  be  an 


Seasickness  Relieved.  57 

. 
effective  therapeutic  agent  in  this  distressing,  and 

sometimes  dangerous,  ailment.  I  say  dangerous,  for, 
if  atheromatous  changes  have  begun  to  take  place  in 
the  arteries,  retching  may  cause  death  by  rup- 
ture of  cerebral  arterioles.  Three  cases  of  personal 
friends  are  recalled,  one  on  shipboard,  where  fatal 
results  have  followed  emesis.  The  ineffectiveness  of 
bromides  and  intoxicants,  and  the  after-effects  of 
these  and  other  forms  of  medication,  made  the  trial 
of  the  new  remedy  interesting.  The  notes  made  of 
numerous  cases,  beginning  with  two  clergymen  — 
who  gratefully  acknowledged  relief — were  never  in- 
tended for  the  public.  Dr.  George  M.  Beard,  how- 
ever, insisted  on  their  publication,  being,  as  he  said, 
the  first  contribution  of  the  kind  to  the  literature  of 
Trance. «) 

In  the  cases  cited,  unconsciousness  was  not  always 
secured  at  the  first  trial,  though  relief  was  immediate, 
with  some  degree  of  somnolence  in  nearly  every  in- 
stance. Others  seemed  insensible  as  if  chloroformed, 
so  that  knife  or  needle  was  unheeded.  One  Parisian, 
in  middle  life,  asked  bewildered,  on  waking,  "  What 
has  happened  to  me  ? "  Another,  a  Welsh  quarry- 
man,  with  whom  no  words  were  spoken,  -neither 
understanding  the  other's  tongue,  almost  immedi- 
ately was  entranced,  and  his  heavy  weight,  thirteen 
stone,  became  a  crushing  load  on  the  operator,  seat- 
ed as  I  was,  behind  him.  Another,  after  four  days 
anguish,  exclaimed,  within  a  moment  after  the  first 


58  Mental  Automatism. 

touch,  "  What  a  heaven  to  be  relieved  of  pain  !"  In 
a  fourth  patient,  the  ventral  and  cerebral  disturb- 
ance was  so  soon  arrested  that  concealed  nitrite  of 
amyl  or  some  other  depressant  was  suspected,  and 
the  excited  query  was  put  by  another,  "  What  was 
on  your  hand  ?" 

Further  details  appear  in  the  Transactions  of  the 
Academy  of  Sciences.  Results,  or  deductions,  are 
what  we  are  looking  for.  Here,  as  in  law,  l'Viden- 
dum  non  a  quo,  sed  ad  quid." 

1.  The  unconsciousness  of  Trance  in  many  cases 
relieves  seasickness  by  restoring  nervous  equilib- 
rium, and  in  surgery  is  sometimes  an  adequate  sub- 
stitute for  ether.  Not  every  one  responds.  Not 
every  one  is  able  to  awaken  that  faith  and  expect- 
ancy, out  of  which  the  phenomena  are  ordinarily 
evolved.  This  persuasion  cometh  not  to  every 
yielding  soul,  still  less  to  the  reluctant,  incredulous. 
Failures  occur  alike  with  three  classes :  Those  who 
are  so  anxious  to  test  the  reality  of  this  automatic, 
involuntary  condition,  that  their  own  alertness,  vigi- 
lance and  introspection  defeat  their  aim ;  those  who 
are  of  an  opposite  temper,  volatile,  voluable  and 
frivolous,  lacking  the  power  to  fix  their  attention  on 
anything;  and  the  dogged,  despairing,  querulous 
sort,  who  seem  to  "  enjoy  poor  health,"  as  they  say. 
Failures,  however,  are  not  decisive.  Sequestration 
and  silence  on  the  part  of  the  patient,  and  patience 


Trance  in  Seasickness.  69 

on  the  part  of  the  experimenter,  have  secured  success 
after  a  dozen  failures. 

2.  Tranciform  states,  where  the  unconsciousness 
is  partial,  incomplete,  usually  afford  proportionate' 
relief.     A  multitude  of  facts  might  be  cited. 

3.  The  sense  of  subjugation  when  one  finds  him- 
self in  the  hands  of  Neptune  or  the  surgeon,  is  a 
helpful  accessory  to  the  operator,  analogous  to  the 
yielding  attitude  of  an  animal  under  a  tamer  and 
trainer,  or  paralyzed  by  panic. 

4.  A  vital  factor  of  success  is  the  feeling  of  cer- 
tainty on  the  part  of  the  experimenter.     Fear  is  not 
more  infectious  than  confidence.     It  is  unintention- 
ally revealed  in  the  eye,  the  voice,  the  step,  the  touch. 
To  its  masterful  influence  the  strongest,  most  intelli- 
gent wills  capitulate.    Possunt  quia  posse  videntur. 

As  to  this  artificial  unconsciousness  as  a  substitute 
for  the  usual  surgical  anesthetics  little  need  be  said. 
A  New  York  physician  who  had  used  it,  remarked, 
at  the  meeting  referred  to,  "  I  can  frankly  admit  the 
main  facts  contained  in  this  most  useful  paper  by 
Professor  Thwing,  not  only  relying  on  his  acute 
and  accurate  process  of  observation,  but  on  my  own 
convictions  after  careful  investigation  of  phenomena 
as  remarkable  as  any  he  relates."  The  president  of  the 
Academy  of  Sciences  spoke  of  seeing  this  same  form 
of  anaesthesia  used  in  surgery,  thirty  years  ago,  in 
Paris.  Still  earlier,  Dr.  Esdaile,  in  India,  performed 
amputations  and  the  removal  of  tumors  from  two  to 


60  Mental  Automatism. 

eighty  pounds  weight,  with  no  other  hypnotic,  ether 
being  then  unknown.  In  the  Maternity  at  Vienna 
this  unconscious  sleep  is  seen  to  be  not  only  a  lethal 
power  in  the  pangs  of  labor,  but  a  practical  haemos- 
tatic, as  would  be  expected  in  the  reduced  tension  of 
the  vascular  system  when  nerve  centers  are  quieted. 
It  once  was  a  source  of  surprise  and  suspicion  that 
tactile  sensibility  remained  when  pain  was  abolished. 
Now  that  Physiology  shows  them  to  be  distinct,  this 
ground  of  doubt  and  distrust  is  removed. 

In  this  connection  I  have  noticed  not  only  the 
arrest  of  pain,  but  of  the  organic  consequences  of 
pain,  through  suggestion  or  otherwise.  Prof.  Del- 
boeuf,  of  Liege,  burned  with  a  hot  iron  both  arms  of 
a  patient,  saying,  before  hand,  that  the  wound  on  the 
on  the  right  arm  would  never  be  felt.  Removing  the 
bandages  the  following  day,  only  a  scorch  remained, 
while  the  left  arm  showed  inflammation  and  a  vesi- 
cular sore.  Both  applications  of  the  iron  were  the 
the  same.  Pain,  as  an  irritant  retards  healing.  Its 
absence  accelerates  repair.  Prof.  Delboeuf  argues 
that  healing  wounds  by  mental  impression  is  a  legiti- 
mate function  of  the  surgeon  when  he  discovers 
this  susceptibility.  This  principle  is  a  key  to  the 
healing  of  the  wounds  tof  African  dervishes,  and  not 
a  few  faith  cures.  I  have,  with  hundreds  of  other 
experimenters,  produced  real  inflammation  through 
hallucinatory  impressions,  as  of  the  sting  of  the  bee, 
and  removed  genuine  pain  by  simple  suggestion. 


Hypnotic  Phenomena.  61 

That  most  cautious  alienist,  Dr.  D.  Hack  Tuke,  of 
London,  puts  "psychical  agents  in  the  A rmamenta 
Medico,  of  every  medical  man."  Dugald  Stewart 
saw  no  reason  why  a  physician  should  scruple  to  use 
them  any  more  than  electricity.  Sir  John  Forbes,  in 
the  British  and  Foreign  Medical  Review,  took  the 
same  ground,  when  he  advised  the  use  of  inert  sub- 
stances at  times,  "for  the  satisfaction  of  the  patient's 
mind,"  alone.  The  French  Academy,  a  century  ago, 
in  rebuking  Mesmer  as  a  charlatan,  enunciated  the 
very  idea  now  illustrated.  "  The  power  which  man 
has  over  the  imagination  may  now  be  reduced  to  an 
art  and  practiced  methodically." 

But  so  many  other  points  are  waiting  notice  that 
the  medical  and  human  aspects  of  this  department  of 
Anthropological  study  must  be  dismissed  with  the 
single  remark,  that  ideation  and  sensation  are 
vitally  and  vividly  connected.  In  the  sphere  of 
special  sense  it  is  eminently  true  that  they  act 
surely  and  swiftly  in  concert,  while  "  an  automaton 
is  substituted  for  the  true  volitional  self,  and  the  will 
is  a  slave  of  a  dream  or  a  suggestion."  Darwin  illus- 
trated this  by  putting  irritating  snuff  in  the  nostrils 
of  several  persons  and  inhibiting  reflex  action  so  that 
they  could  not  sneeze. 

OTHER  PHENOMENA.— The  lecturer  on  physiology 
at  Westminster  Hospital  says  that  when  he  was 
hypnotized  he  seemed  to  exist  in  duplicate ;  his  inner 
self  alive  to  an  external  world,  but  f  ally  determined 


62  Mental  Automatism. 

not  to  interfere  with  the  acts  of  the  outer  self.  This 
indisposition  or  inability  to  control  volition  increased 
until  consciousness  ceased.  He  then  conversed  in 
German,  but  did  not  recall  his  remarks  afterward, 
though  he  did  ejaculations  in  Italian,  connected 
with  readings  in  that  tongue  the  day  previous. 
These  acts  of  his  outer  self  seemed  fatuous  and  irra- 
tional to  his  incapacitated  inner  self.  When  he  tried 
to  strike  the  operator,  he  had  no  more  power  to  do  so 
than  the  Lotus  Eaters,  "Deep  asleep,  yet  all  awake, 
weighted  with  heaviness."  He  put  his  fingers  into 
what  he  knew  was  flame,  unable  to  resist.  Afferent 
impressions  and  efferent  processes  went  on,  yet  so 
identified  was  he  with  the  experimenter,  and  so 
obedient  to  his  will,  his  own  individuality  was  great- 
ly obscured ;  indeed,  he  was  hardly  disenchanted  the 
next  day,  although  going  to  his  University  duties. 
The  experience  of  a  London  surgeon  and  of  an  edu- 
cated clergyman,  added  to  the  foregoing,  are  given 
by  Dr.  Tuke  in  his  work  on  "Sleep -Walking."  To 
him,  to  Prof.  Victor  Horsley,  and  Dr.  J.  Hughlings 
Jackson,  of  the  National  Hospital  for  Paralyzed  and 
Epileptic,  I  am  indebted  for  clinical  opportunities  at 
Bethlem  Hospital,  at  Queen's  Square  and  University 
College,  London. 

Heidenhain  further  illustrates  this  ideoplastic, 
automatic  condition  by  experiments  on  his  brother, 
whom  he  made  remove,  while  asleep,  his  carefully 
cultivated  and  much  valued  whiskers.  This  bare- 


Tests  of  Trance.  63 

faced  outrage  greatly  angered  him.  The  same  ex- 
perience is  related  by  Dr.  Esdaile,  in  India,  when  a 
devotee  had  removed  a  long  finger-nail  sacredly 
kept.  The  emotions  show  the  genuineness  of  the 
experiment.  I  have  offered  a  gold  eagle  to  one,  and 
a  jeweled  ring  to  another,  in  good  faith,  promising 
them  ownership,  if  each  would  extend  the  hand  or 
open  the  eyes,  but  each  interpreted  the  very  em- 
phasis of  invitation  as  a  declaration  of  inability,  as  it 
really  was. 

Inadequate  analogues  of  this  disturbed  and  tyran- 
nizing state  of  mental  perception  are  furnished  by 
the  strange  antics  of  the  late  Prof.  Robert  Hamilton, 
of  Aberdeen,  and  of  Gauss,  the  famous  German 
mathematician,  when  carried  away  by  some  domi 
nant  idea.  They  acted  like  machines  in  their  rela- 
tions to  what  was  outside  of  themselves.  Other  cases 
nearly  as  marked  may  be  recalled  by  almost  any 
one,  which  show  enthrallment  of  the  will  in  its  guid- 
ing, purposeful  energy.  They  are  hardly  indentical, 
however,  with  the  duplex  life  shown  by  the  true 
Trance,  for  in  hypnosis,  as  Gurney  says,  the  atten- 
tion, so  far  from  being  withdrawn  from  what  is  auto- 
matically done,  is  concentrated  with  special  activity 
on  these  acts  in  obedience  to  suggestion  without. 
The  action  is  reflex,  so  far  as  the  certainty  of  re- 
sponse to  stimulus  is  concerned,  yet  for  all  that,  "  a 
conscious  reflex  action."  The  psychic  rather  than 
the  physical  sense  of  the  word  "  reflex"  is  employed. 


64  Mental  Automatism. 

Normally  we  focus  thought  on  one  aim,  and  yet  yield 
to  a  score  of  subordinate  perceptions  that  modify 
and  make  our  action  rational.  Trance  breaks  this 
equilibrium.  So  does  absent-mindedness.  But  in 
this,  the  mind  works  "with  unusual  force  and  indi- 
viduality in  its  self-selected  channels,  and  what  its 
owner  says  or  does  in  response  to  external  influences 
is  as  little  attended  to  by  him  as  the  influence  itself. 
The  other  mind  is  working  with  marked  absence  of 

• 

individuality  in  a  channel  elected  by  others,  and 
what  its  owner  says  or  does  in  response  to  external 
influence  is  that  on  which  his  attention  is  concen- 
trated to  the  complete  exclusion  of  every  other 
thought." 

Leaving  abruptly  this  form  of  mono-ideism  and 
the  opposing  views  of  theorists  arguing  from 
purely  mental  or  physical  outlooks,  "  the  misty 
bights  of  purely  abstract  reasoning,"  passing  over  a 
wide  field  elsewhere  studied  <8)  and  so  omitted  here, 
I  allude,  in  passing,  to  that  which  seems  to  me  to  en- 
courage what  psychologists  till  recently  ridiculed. 

THOUGHT  TRANSFERENCE  or  telepathy  is  that  sup- 
posed dynamic  connection  between  one  brain  and 
another  which  enables  the  one  to  communicate  with 
the  other,  independently  of  the  recognized  channels 
of  sense.  Volumes  have  been  filled  with  the  reported 
cases  of  spontaneous  telepathy,  where  the  agent  or 
percipient  was  in  danger,  or  otherwise  disturbed, 
and  volumes  more  ought  to  be  filled  with  cases  of 


Thought  Transference.  65 

experimental  thought-reading,  which  transcend,  if 
they  do  not  oppose  hitherto  known  laws.  Referring 
to  this  inter-communication,  the  late  Prof.  Carpen- 
ter, of  London  University,  thirty  years  ago,  frankly 
asked,  "  Would  any  man  of  science  have  a  right  to 
say  it  is  impossible  ?  Some  of  the  writer's  own  ex- 
periences have  led  him  to  suspect  that  a  power  of 
intuitively  perceiving  what  is  passing  in  the  mind 
of  another,  called  thought-reading,  may  be  extra- 
ordinarily exalted  by  the  entire  concentration  of  at- 
tention." Prof.  Janet  records  fifteen  completely 
successful  cases  of  trance-induction  at  a  distance ;  W 
the  Revue  Scientifique  narrates  the  same  success  of 
Dr.  Herecourt,  a  colleague  of  M.  Richet.  Without 
word  or  gesture  he  willed  D.,  his  subject,  to  sleep 
while  in  the  midst  of  animated  conversation  with 
friends.  Once  he  made  D.  sleep  at  3  P.  M.  ,  while  in  a 
remote  locality,  and  being  called  away,  forgot  to 
break  the  spell  till  5  P.  M.,  though  D.  had,  in  a  normal 
state,  been  asked  to  call  at  4.30.  In  the  evening 
D.  said  that  at  3  P.  M.,  a  strange  desire  to  sleep  was 
felt,  a  habit  never  indulged  in  during  the  day.  A 
servant  found  D.  unconscious,  who,  in  spite  of  efforts 
to  rouse,  remained  so  till  5  p.  M.  To  exclude  the  pos- 
sibility of  collusion,  on  the  common  explanation  of 
"  Expectancy,5'  or  "  Chance/*  disinterested  parties 
varied  the  test.  The  results  were  the  same.  Dr. 
Beard's  method  of  eliminating  fraud  was  also  tried. 
Dr.  H.  willed  wakefulness,  and  verbally  commanded 


66  Mental  Automatism. 

sleep  and  vice  versa.  The  will,  not  the  word,  pre- 
vailed. In  each  case  D.  innocently  told  the  doctor 
that  he  had  failed. 

The  Tribune  Medicale  gives  an  account  of  more 
than  one  hundred  trials  of  sommeil  a  distance,  by  Dr. 
Dusart,  who,  vrith  varying  tests,  induced  or  arrested 
hy steroid  conditions ;  prevented  or  allowed  at  will, 
miles  away,  the  father  of  the  patient  to  induce  sleep, 
as  he  had  learned  to  do  after  the  physician  had  dis- 
continued his  visits.  What  is  this  "magical  in- 
fluence proceeding  from  intelligent  willing"  as 
Schopenhaur  calls  it,  in  his  "  World,  Will  and  Idea  ?" 
What  is  the  nexus  between  these  identical  processes 
of  physic  interaction  ?  Is  there  a  "potential  unity 
of  all  similarly  constructed  minds  ?  "  That  we  can- 
not now  tell  what  that  latent  unity  is,  if  any,  should 
not  militate  against  the  supposition  of  a  wider  self- 
hood than  we  ordinarily  claim.  This  involves,  as  Gm> 
ney  says,  no  disruption  of  individuality,  while  it  does 
involve  a  pervading  sense  of  association  with  an- 
other organization  and  a  special  mental  sensitive- 
ness, at  times,  as  when  shock  of  peril  or  approach  of 
death  concentrate  will  and  attention. 

My  own  experiments  and  those  of  other  medical 
friends  have  been  so  successful  that  I  heartily  repeat 
the  dictum  of  Dr.  Carpenter  on  this  point,  published 
a  generation  ago,  that  we  shall  be  wise  "in  main- 
taining a  reserve  of  possibility  "  in  reference  to  phe- 
nomena of  this  class,  occult,  but  not  incredible. 


Scientific  Candor.  67 

Truth  is  a  sphere.  We  see  segments,  sections,  frag- 
ments. We  know  in  part.  Philosophy  asks,  "  What 
may  we  know  ? "  but  science,  exact,  exacting,  deal- 
ing in  frozen  facts,  asks  "  What  do  we  know  ? "  The 
opinions  of  the  non-expert  are  often  more  under  the 
control  of  the  will  than  of  the  understanding.  A 
true,  scientific  instinct  avoids  prepossessions,  indo- 
cility  and  obstinacy  in  receiving  evidence,  as  reso- 
lutely as  it  avoids  romancing,  sentimentality  and 
credulity.  It  is  hospitable  to  all  truth.  This  leads  one 
to  say  with  Socrates,  "  I  would  be  gladly  refuted  if  I 
say  aught  untrue,  and  would  gladly  refute  another  if 
untrue ;  but  not  more  glad  than  to  be  myself  refuted 
if  untrue."  To  be  free,  ourselves,  from  error  is  the 
first  duty,  and  to  free  another  is  a  privilege  not  less 
sacred. 

This  study  of  what  we  may  call  Morbid  Psychology 
is  related  to  serious  and  perplexing  moral  questions. 
Heredity,  environment,  parentage,  atavism,  and 
other  facts  modifying  human  responsibility,  at  once 
confront  us.  Are  we  only  what  our  ancestors  made 
us,  or  have  we  still  the  power  of  contrary  choice  ?  Is 
the  will  a  mere  deduction  of  successive  states  of 
mind,  and  our  conscious  personality  a  mere  memory 
of  past  and  passing  experiences  ?  Are  our  legal  re- 
straints and  educational  methods  a  mockery  ?  If  the 
Cartesian  dogma  is  to  stand,  ''Animals  are  auto- 
mata," and  man  to  be  but  the  best  machine,  which 
Descartes  would  not  admit ;  if  the  potentialities  of 


68  Mental  Automatism. 

matter  explain  the  genesis  of  mind  ;  if  character  is 
made  for  us  and  not  by  us,  and  the  idea  of  duty  is  a 
delusion ;  then  Atkinson  and  Martineau  are  right, 
"  I  am  a  creature  of  necessity.  I  claim  neither  merit 
nor  demerit ;  I  am  as  completely  the  result  of  my 
nature,  and  impelled  to  do  what  I  do  as  tne  needle  to 
point  to  the  pole,  or  the  puppet  to  move  as  the  string 
is  pulled.  I  cannot  alter  my  will  or  be  other  than 
what  I  am.  I  cannot  deserve  either  reward  or  punish- 
ment." If  this  be  true,  life  is  not  worth  living.  But 
it  is  not  true  !  Common  sense  revolts  against  it. 
Every  sane  man  knows  that  he  has  the  power  of 
choice  and  self-control.  Even  the  insane  "  can  com- 
mand themselves  up  to  a  certain  point,"  and  the  laws 
of  a  lunatic  asylum  always  recognize  this  fact.<10) 

Those  who  accept  the  authority  of  the  Scriptures 
are  satisfied  with  its  restatements  of  man's  primitive 
and  irradicable  convictions.  The  soul  that  sinneth, 
it  shall  die.  The  children  shall  not  bear  the  iniquity 
or  guilt  of  the  fathers.  Though  the  law  of  uniform- 
ity prevails,  there  is  the  law  of  diversity,  a  tendency 
to  divert  from  the  original  type.  There  is  also  the 
law  of  compensation.  Environment,  which  works 
for  evil,  also  works  in  redemptive  processes  ;  slower, 
perhaps,  than  deteriorating  influences,  but  surely  in 
the  way  of  recreation.  A  friend  of  mine  knew  a  lad 
in  St.  Giles,  London,  whose  father  was  a  burglar  and 
whose  mother  was  a  prostitute.  He  was  keen,  adroit, 
intelligent,  but  thoroughly  wicked.  He  robbed  my 


Regenerative  Forces.  69 

informant  while  talking  with  him.  He  would  have 
ended  his  life,  very  likely,  in  a  street  brawl,  in  prison, 
or  on  the  gibbet,  had  he  been  left  alone.  But,  put 
into  a  Christian  home,  he  became  a  pure,  upright 
man,  and  never  was  known  to  violate  the  principles 
of  strict  honesty  and  truth.  I  saw  in  Spain  a  girl 
whom  the  missionary  described  as  a  "  perfect  angel," 
so  chaste,  lovely  and  Christ-like.  Yet  she,  two 
years  before,  was,  he  said,  "  a  perfect  devil,"  so  vile 
in  heart  and  life.  There  is  a  freedom  of  choice  and 
a  recuperative  power  in  a  will  set  towards  yirtue. 
There  is  a  renewing  power  in  a  will  set  towards 
virtue,  and  in  a  helpful  environment,  by  which 
congenital  evils  are  corrected. 

As  Anthropology  is  justly  called  the  "  Queen 
of  Sciences,"  so  Psychology  is,  by  far,  the  most  im- 
portant department  of  this  enticing-  study.  It  in- 
volves a  knowledge  of  all  the  rest,  man's  physical 
and  psychic,  his  social  and  ethnic  relations,  with  all 
the  events  and  products  of  human  existence,  illumi- 
nating the  questions  of  his  origin,  progress,  welfare 
and  destiny.  European  societies  have  given  less 
prominence  to  the  psychic  than  to  the  physical  and 
historic  features ;  but  the  New  York  Academy  of 
Anthropology  was  founded  with  special  reference 
to  the  study  of  the  neglected  data  with  which  this 
paper  is  concerned .  We  are  endeavoring  to  verify, 
classify  and  formulate  facts  of  the  Involuntary  Life 
which  underlie  the  whole  structure  of  philosophy, 


70  Mental  Automatism. 

religion  and  social  life,  in  its  structural  forces.  Psy- 
chology is  the  youngest  of  sciences,  we  are  told.  This 
may  explain  some  crudities  and  errors,  for  children 
are  often  pretentious  and  presumptuous.  The  gen- 
erals of  Alexander  fancied  that  they  saw  the  Nile  of 
the  far  west,  when  really  it  was  the  Indus  of  the 
East.  Generalizing  from  insufficient  data  an  un- 
scientific student  may  jump  at  a  conclusion  as  wide 
from  the  truth  as  is  the  Indus  from  the  Nile  ! 

"  Non-expertness  in  science,"  says  Dr.  Beard, 
' '  makes  more  blunders  than  the  most  atrocious  dis- 
honesty. It  cannot  be  too  often  repeated,  line  upon 
line,  precept  upon  precept,  that  in  science  the  prime 
requisite  is  not  honesty,  not  general  ability,  not 
skepticism,  not  genius  even,  in  other  departments, 
but  expert  skill.  That  being  absent  all  else  is  as 
sounding  brass  and  a  tinkling  cymbal."  He  refers 
to  an  educated  physician  of  acute  observation,  skep- 
tical, as  to  psychical  phenomena,  who  with  this 
panoply  of  prejudice  cannot  attend  a  seance  with- 
out falling  into  a  trance  state.  The  account  he 
afterward  gives  of  his  vagaries  are  as  amusing  to 
himself  as  they  are  to  his  friends.  He  will  hardly 
expect  to  become  an  expert. 

It  is  because  of  this  natural  disqualification  on  the 
part  of  some  experimenters  and  the  impatient  and 
superficial  methods  of  others,  that  the  course  of 
science  has  been  a  halting,  zigzag  advance,  as  Prof. 
Huxley  admits.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  its  hiero- 


Dignity  of  Science.  71 

phants  often  speak  disdainfully  of  introducing  dis- 
covered truth  into  the  patrimony  of  general  knowl- 
edge as  "a  work  of  vulgarization."  There  is  an 
esoteric  and  an  exoteric  side  of  these  lofty  themes. 
Science  is  not  to  dilute  her  teachings,  or  cheapen  her 
treasures,  by  ill-timed  familiarity.  The  phenomena 
before  us  have  been  justly  viewed  with  prejudice  be- 
cause of  the  grotesque  and  mercenary  uses  made  of 
them.  But  all  reverent  students  of  every  class  and 
calling  in  life,  all  who  are  qualified  by  nature,  tern, 
per  and  training  to  prosecute  these  experiments  and 
formulate  their  results,  will  find  recognition  and  re- 
spect. 

The  foregoing  considerations  are  not  the  utterance 
of  final  truth.  They  are  intended  to  elicit,  and  not 
to  close  discussion.  As  an  accomplished  scholar,  an 
English  knight,  known  in  both  hemispheres  for  his 
medical  and  surgical  skill,  remarked  to  me  at  the 
close  of  a  conversation  on  the  Unconscious  Life:  "  I 
feel  like  a  little  child."  So  must  every  adventurous 
explorer  into  this  solemn  realm  of  mystery  feel.  Yet 
truth  is  alluring.  Shall  we,  then,  stand  still  like 
islands,  or  move  on  like  ships  ? 


(1)  Mind,  April  1887.     "  Science  and  tlie  Bishops. " 

(2)  Francis  Speir,  jr.     Pop.  Science  Monthly,  March,  1888. 

(3)  Tyndall,    "Vichrow  and   Evolution."    Tyndall,  "Physiology 
and  Pathology  of  Mind, ' '  p.  124. 


72  Mental  Automatism. 

(4)  Lotze   "Microcosm,"  Bk.   II. ,    iii.      Smyth's  "Old    Faiths.'* 
Mach's  "  Die  Willensfreiheit  des  Menschen." 

(5)  "Grundzuge  der  Phys.  Psychologic,"  p.  730. 

(6)  Thwing's  "  Hand  Book  of  Anthropology, "  chaps.  VII.,  VIII. 

(7)  Accordingly,  a  paper  was  read  by  me,  Jan.  22,  1883,  before  the 
N.  Y.'  Academy  of  Sciences  on  ' '  Trance  as  related  to  Surgery  and  Sea- 
Sickness."    My  friend  had  promised  to  be  present  and  corroborate  the 
principles  which  my  experiments  had  illustrated.       Alas,  that  very 
hour  Dr.  Beard,  himself,  was  entering  the  solemn  trance  of  death ! 
Suddenly  interrupted  in  his  studies,  he  passed  away  before  many  knew 
of  his  illness.     His  last  desire  was  this,  that  he  might  have  strength  to 
record  the  experiences  of  a  dying  man,  or  at  least,  that  some  one  might 
continue  the  study  of  this  theme  which  had  so  long  fascinated  his 
adventurous  thought.      Tuos  ne  ego,  0  mece  spes  inanes,  labentes  ocules 
tuum  fugientem  spirilum  vidi !     Quintilian. 

(8)  Clinical  and  Forensic  Study  of  Trance.     Medico-Legal  Society. 

(9)  Revue  PhilosopJdque,  Feb.  1888. 

(10)  Medical  Jurisprudence,  Hamilton,  p.  132. 


A  CLINICAL  AND  FOBENSIC 
STUDY  OF  TRANCE. 

Read  before  the  Medico-Legal  Society,  New  York  City,  AprU  10, 1889. 


The  battle-ground  of  science  to-day  is  the  Involun- 
tary Life,  or,  as  another  has  phrased  it,  "the  relation 
of  Automatism  to  Responsibility."  The  theme  opens  a 
wide  continent  of  thought.  A  few  landmarks  wilJ 
prove  helpful.  A  new  chapter  of  the  militant  history 
of  human  speculations  is  being  written.  A  new 
arena  of  conflict  is  reached.  New  forces  are  mar- 
shalled. New  weapons  of  warfare  are  demanded, 
and  new  strategic  points  are  to  be  gained.  Vast 
changes  are  seen  in  philosophic  thought,  in  tra- 
ditional theology,  in  historic  criticism  and  in  scientific 
research.  The  limits  of  scientific  inquiry  are  more 
clearly  understood,  and  the  essential  unity  of  truth 
proved.  The  very  perturbations  of  the  human  mind 
often  herald  the  incoming  of  new  light,  just  as  the 
near  approach  of  Neptune,  through  measureless 
space,  was  foretold  by  prophetic  disturbances  in  the 
outermost  orbit  of  our  ever  broadening  solar  system. 


74  A  Study  of  Trance. 

Let  not  ignorance  and  prejudice  silence  any  Lever- 
rier  of  our  day,  who  dares  to  widen  the  field  of  in- 
quiry, or  force  him  to  stand,  as  in  ancient  days,  the 
propounder  of  a  new  law  stood,  with  a  halter  about 
his  neck,  with  which  the  populace  might  hang1  him 
if  displeased  with  the  innovation.  ^  We  must  not 
retard  the  progress  of  knowledge  by  looking  at  the 
phenomena  of  life  "  Through  the  dulled  eyes  of 
custom  and  traditional  opinions/' but  show  "open- 
ness and  simplicity  of  mind,  readiness  to  entertain, 
willingness  to  accept,  and  enthusiasm  to  pursue  a 
new  idea,"(2)  remembering  that — 

"  There  are  great  truths  that  pitch  their  shining  tents 
Outside  our  walls,  and  though  but  dimly  seen 
In  the  grey  dawn,  they  will  be  manifest 
When  the  light  widens  into  perfect  day." 

The  facts  of  the  Involuntary  Life,  of  which  the 
Trance  is  the  supreme  expression,  have  been  ob- 
served for  centuries.  But  not  until  recent  years 
have  biological  and  medical  investigators  classified 
and  formulated  the  phenomena  involved.  Cerebro- 
physiology  has  latterly  made  rapid  advance.  The 
first  medical  book  placed  in  my  hands  by  my  pre- 
ceptor, thirty-seven  years  ago,  was  Bichat's  Anatomy. 
Professor  Huxley  calls  this  learned  Frenchman  "The 
acute  founder  of  general  Anatomy."  Bichat  laid 
down,  for  the  first  time,  the  distinction  between  the 
organic  and  animal,  the  conscious  and  unconscious 
life  of  the  individual.  He  made  life  to  be  the  unity 


Psychology  and  Medicine.  75 

of  separate  lives  of  organic  parts.     This  doctrine  of 
synthesis  he  applied  to  pathology. 

Diseases  were  like  the  perturbations  of  the  planet- 
ary system.  Therapeutics  must  show  how  to  elimi- 
nate them.  The  way  was  cleared  for  a  closer  unity 
between  biology  and  medicine.  "  Science  and  Cul- 
ture," by  Darwin,  closes  with  the  query,  "  How  can 
medical  education  be  so  arranged  as  to  give  the  stu- 
dent a  firm  grasp  of  biology  ?  Without  it,  he  is  but 
an  empiric,  notwithstanding  all  the  progress  of  what 
is  called  " Scientific  Medicine." 

Medicine,  like  agriculture,  took  its  origin  in  the 
needs  of  man.  As  Chemistry  and  vegetable  physi- 
ology gave  agriculture  a  scientific  basis,  so  psychology 
is  to  give  to  medicine  a  wider,  richer  development 
in  the  near  future.  In  1870,  The  American  Medical 
Association  adopted  a  resolution  requesting  medical 
colleges  to  establish  chairs  of  psychology.  It  was 
then  said,  "Very  few  in  the  medical  profession 
understand  it.  Here  is  an  immense  field  to  culti- 
vate, and  it  will  yield  a  rich  harvest.  Books,  peri- 
odicals and  lectures  give  only  a  glimmer.  One  must 
patiently,  persistently  study  his  feelings,  impressions 
and  repulsions  in  various  relations  and  conditions." 
He  must  also  be  an  acute  and  accurate  observer  of 
these  conditions  in  others.  Then  the  sneer  of  Vol- 
taire will  no  longer  have  any  basis  in  fact :  "  The 
doctor  is  one  who  pours  drugs  of  which  he  knows 
little,  into  a  body  of  which  he  knows  less."  Prof. 


76  A  Study  of  Trance. 

Tyndall  says,  that  "Hitherto  medicine  has  been  a 
collection  of  empirical  rules,  interpreted  according 
to  the  capacity  of  each  physician."  But  we  need  to 
know  the  mind  and  soul  as  well  as  the  liver  and 
spleen.  We  need  to  treat  the  patient  as  well  as  the 
disease.  Then  will  be  realized  the  fullness  of  the 
Hippocratean  beatitude,  "  That  physician  who  is 
also  a  philosopher  is  godlike." 

PSYCHOLOGY  AND  LAW.— The  basis  of  litigation  is 
continually  found  in  alleged  disorders  of  the  mind 
and  nervous  system.  The  intelligent  lawyer  must 
study  the  neuropathic  condition  of  criminals,  with 
the  immediate  and  remote  factors  involved,  in  order 
to  determine  the  degree  of  responsibility,  and  so  of 
guilt.  Nowhere  in  the  world,  according  to  Ed- 
mund Burke,  is  law  so  generally  studied  as  in  this 
country.  De  Tocqueville  made  it  one  of  the  supreme 
tutelar  forces  of  our  Republic.  Had  he  lived  to  see 
the  completion  of  the  first  century  of  American  law, 
he  would  have  spoken  with  greater  emphasis ;  for, 
though  "All  rovernmental  affairs  travel  in  the  path 
of  precedence,"  (3>  there  has  been  great  advance  in 
the  line  of  procedure,  evidence  and  competence  of 
witnesses.  Still,  it  is  true  that  laws  are  changing. 
''Leges  humance  nascuntur,  vivunt  et  moriuntur : 
posteriores priores  contrarias  abrogant."^  Had  our 
political  system  been  less  flexible,  it  never  would 
have  survived  the  strain  to  which  the  exigencies  of 
its  first  century  have  subjected  it.  Ex- Judge  Davis 


The  Medical  Expert.  77 

points  oilt  the  needs  of  still  further  changes,  when  he 
refers,  in  the  line  of  this  discussion,  to  tho  Status 
Ebrietatis,  and  the  place  of  the  expert.  He  remarks: 
"It  has  long  been  evident  that  the  State  needs  to 
give  some  systematic  attention  to  the  adequate  pre- 
sentation, in  criminal  trials,  of  the  light  which  science 
throws  on  the  subject,  when  the  prosecution  is  met 
by  the  defence  of  insanity."  He  suggests  that  "  All 
expert  testimony  of  a  medical  character  be  independ- 
ent of  the  selection  of  the  parties,  and  placed,  in  re- 
spect to  impartiality — though  perhaps  not  in  control- 
ling authority  upon  the  jury — in  position  like  that  of 
the  judge."  Speaking  on  this  point,  one  of  the 
judges  of  the  Supreme  Court  recently  remarked  to 
the  writer:  "You  medical  men  instinctively  look 
at  the  facts  of  a  case  from  a  purely  scientific  point 
of  view,  while  the  law  looks  at  the  matter  in  the 
light  of  the  public  welfare."  So  Thucydides  says 
that  Cleon  urged  the  Athenians  to  execute  the  Mityl- 
cenean  revolters  as  an  act  ef  retaliation,  while 
Diodotus  argued  that  they  were  sitting  in  deliber- 
ation and  not  in  judgment ;  that  expediency,  and 
not  naked  justice,  was  to  be  considered;  not  what 
might  be  doae  under  the  law,  but  what  was  ad- 
visable. The  man  of  science  should  not  be  desti- 
tute of  a  judicial  temper  and  the  lawyer  should 
not  -lack  a  true,  scientific  spirit.  But  there  are 
other  lines  in  which  these  preliminary  considerations 
point.  All  the  learned  professions  are  equally  inter- 


78  A  Study  of  Trance. 

ested  in  the  survey  of  this  field  of  Automatism  and 
Responsibility. 

PSYCHOLOGY  AND  THEOLOGY. — The  intelligent 
understanding  of  practical  Psychology  will  help  to 
rid  religion  of  superstition,  and  give  illumination  to 
the  teachings  of  Christianity,  both  as  to  the  life  that 
now  is  and  that  which  is  to  come.  There  are  prob- 
lems of  an  exegetical  character  which  the  theologian 
will  find  cleared  of  much  of  their  difficulty  by  the 
facts  which  wait  enunciation.  There  are  historical 
and  homiletical  relations  which  would  require  ample 
space  to  unfold.  The  moral  and  religious  bearings 
of  the  Involuntary  Life  have  been  elsewhere  con- 
sidered.^ We  are  now  ready  to  look  at  the  genesis 
and  features  of  that  form  of  the  Involuntary  Life 
known  as  TRANCE. 

GENESIS  OF  TRANCE. — Trance,  transit,  "the  passing 
over  "  from  the  voluntary,  conscious  state  to  the  in- 
voluntary and  automatic,  is  a  condition  or  process 
which  varies  with  the  cause  which  originates  it.  It 
may  be  purely  a  pathological  condition.  It  may  be 
induced  by  suggestion,  fixation,  manipulation,  or 
other  means,  as  a  scientific  experiment.  The  initial 
and  terminal  bounds,  with  the  intermediate  phen- 
omena, change  as  these  conditions  change.  There 
have  been  fourteen  kinds  of  Trance  described,  ac- 
cording to  clinical  features,  such  as  somnambulistic, 
intellectual  (or  reverie),  emotional,  ecstatic,  alcoholic, 
mesmeric,  epileptic  and  cataleptic. (6)  These  all  have 


Strong  Men  Entranced.  79 

some  features  in  common,  as  in  the  hypertrophy  and 
persistence  of  mental  impressions,  but  vary  in  detail 
according  to  the  origin  of  the  condition  and  the  in- 
dividual in  whom  Trance  is  induced. 

In  passing,  it  should  be  understood  that,  so  far 
from  being  a  proof  of  mental  weakness,  Trance  is  a 
condition  "  into  which  many,  if  not  most,  of  those 
who  have  left  the  stamp  of  their  own  character  on 
the  religious  history  of  mankind  have  been  liable  to 
pass  at  times.  The  union  of  intense  feeling,  strong 
volition,  long  continued  thought — the  conditions  of 
all  wide  and  lasting  influence — aided  in  many  cases 
by  the  withdrawal  from  the  lower  life  of  the  support 
which  is  needed  to  maintain  a  healthy  equilibrium, 
appears  to  have  been  more  than  '  the  earthen  vessel' 
will  bear.  Ekstasis  is  the  state  in  which  a  man  has 
passed  out  of  the  usual  order  of  his  life,  beyond  the 
usual  limits  of  consciousness  and  volition.  Excessus, 
in  like  manner,  became  a  synonyme  for  the  condition 
of  seeming  death  to  the  outer  world,  which  we  speak 
of  as  Trance.  From  the  time  of  Hippocrates,  who 
used  it  to  describe  the  loss  of  conscious  perception,  it 
had  probably  borne  the  connotation  which  it  has 
had,  with  shades  of  meaning  for  good  or  evil,  ever 
since. "  <7> 

CLINICAL  FEATURES. — St.  Paul  and  other  apostles 
and  prophets  give  some  hints  as  to  the  origin  and 
characteristics  of  this  state.  Many  other  great  men 
since  have  left  important  data,  particularly  the  emi- 


80  A  Study  of  Trance. 

nent  scientist,  Professor  Agassi z.  He  invited  experi- 
ments on  himself,  and  made  a  conscientious  record 
of  them  over  his  own  signature. (8)  One  feature  of 
value  in  this  clinical  record  is  the  triumph  gained 
over  a  superior  mind  that  resisted  the  operator,  and 
his  candid  statement  of  the  delight  which  followed 
his  surrendry.  The  experimenter  was  Townshend, 
at  Neufchatel,  and  Mons.  Desor  was  witness.  "  The 
moment  I  saw  him  endeavoring  to  exert  an  action 
upon  me,  I  silently  addressed  the  Author  of  all  things, 
beseeching  Him  to  give  me  power  to  resist  the  in- 
fluence, and  to  be  conscientious  in  regard  to  the  facts." 
Ocular  fixation  induced  weariness,  and  digital  move- 
ments in  front  of  the  eyes  deepened  drowsiness. 
Other  manipulations  induced  "  an  indescribable  sen- 
sation of  delight."  Speech  and  vision  were  suspend- 
ed, but  hearing  remained.  After  an  hour  of  help- 
lessness, Agassiz  "wished  to  wake,  but  could  not. 
It  appeared  to  me  that  enough  had  been  done  with 
me." 

Though  in  a  state  of  confused  pleasure,  he  "was 
inwardly  sorrowful  to  have  it  prolonged."  Quick 
transverse  movements,  outward  from  the  middle  of 
the  face,  at  once  broke  the  spell.  A  word  would  have 
done  as  well.  From  my  records  of  140  cases  of 
Trance,  during  the  past  six  years,  including  the  writ- 
ten statements  of  some  very  intelligent  patients 
themselves,  I  could  easily  compile  a  large  volume. 
Enough,  however,  has  been  said  as  to  the  experi- 


Exciting  Causes.  81 

mental  or  artificial  Trance  in  its  clinical  features.  If 
we  attempt  to  explain  the  pathology  of  the  uncon- 
scious, automatic  life,  we  find  ourselves  involved  in 
endless  speculations.  The  alleged  vis  magnetica  of 
ancient  thaumaturgists  we  ignore.  That  this  is  a 
subjective  phenomenon  needs  now  no  argument. 
Sudden  and  enrapturing  emotions,  continued  fasting 
or  overpowering  fear,  develop  it.  A  man  of  pene, 
trating  and  commanding  will — by  slow  and  seductive 
processes,  or  by  swift  assault  that  leaves  no  time  to 
question  or  repel,  startling  and  abrupt  as  the  gong 
of  the  Salpetriere — may  capture  both  consenting  and 
recalcitrant  souls.  Prof.  Laycock  thinks  that  the 
theory  of  reflex  action  in  the  cortex  of  the  brain  ex- 
plains the  exaltation  of  perception  and  the  dulling  of 
self-consciousness.  Another  suggests  cerebral  an-* 
eemia,  or  analogous  encephalic  exhaustion  at  the 
expense  of  sensory  ganglia. 

Dr.  Mortimer  Granville  makes  normal  sleep  the 
sum  total  of  five  factors,  muscular,  visceral,  sensory, 
automatic  and  cerebral  repose.  He  differentiates 
thirty-six  varieties  of  disturbance,  which  it  would  be 
irrelevant  now  to  name.  Dr.  Liebault  assumes  the 
fact  of  serene  and  restful  repose  in  hypnosis,  from 
not  only  the  bodily  ease  and  facial  expression,  but 
from  the  answer  uniformly  given  by  the  entranced, 
when  left  alone — to  the  query,  "what  are  you  think- 
ing of  ?"  He  says,  "nothing,"  whereas  in  ordinary 
sleep  the  brain  is  active.  The  tracings  of  the  myo- 


S3  A  Study  of  Trance. 

graph  and  pneumograph  are  helpful  at  this  point, 
as  well  as  in  the  exclusion  of  the  possibility  of  simu- 
lation. 

From  the  days  of  Liebnitz,  Mental  Automatism  has 
been  studied  with  increasing  attention.  Its  limit  and 
condition  is  the  personal  equation  which  distinguish 
men.  Braid,  nearly  half  a  century  ago,  laid  the 
foundations  on  which  Prof.  Charcot,  ten  years  ago, 
began  to  rear  a  scientific  system.  This  accomplished 
French  scholar  began  with  the  simplest  clinical  facts 
of  hysteria  as  a  basis,  such  as  the  reflex  action  of  the 
cortex,  a  passive  and  plastic  condition  favorable  to 
control.  He  noted  also  certain  zones  of  cutaneous 
areas  and  hypnogenous  pressure  points,  irregularly 
distributed  over  the  body,  the  manipulation  of  which 
'induces  sleep,  as  the  pressure  of  other  points  induces 
tetanic  paroxysms  in  some  epileptic  patients.  An- 
other fact  proved,  was  the  abortive  treatment  of 
hysterical  attacks  by  hypnosis,  A  third,  was  the 
palliative  and  remedial  effects,  by  the  same  agent,  in 
muscular  contractions  and  paresis,  which  compli- 
cated the  original  trouble.  Indeed,  the  field  is  so 
large,  and  the  clinical  facts  so  abundant  and  enticing, 
there  is  danger  of  giving  an  undue  space  to  them, 
rather  than  to  the  forensic  relations  of  the  whole 
subject.  We  pass  at  once  to  the  ethical  and  legal 
bearings  of  Trance. 

LEGAL   BEARINGS. — Six  questions    will    guide  us. 
They  have  been  all  presented  to,  and  answered  by, 


Legal  Questions.  S3 

one  of  our  ablest  judges,  but  his  opinion  and  my 
own  are  withheld,  as  the  aim  of  this  paper  is  tenta- 
tive and  suggestive,  intended  to  elicit  and  not  to  close 
discussion. 

1. — Is  any  reconstruction  of  the  laws  of  Evidence 
needed  in  view  of  these  facts  of  the  Involuntary 
Life? 

Allusion  has  been  made  to  perversions  of  the 
senses,  to  the  hypertrophy  and  continuity  of  mental 
impressions.  To  this  might  be  added  a  second,  the 
moral  as  well  as  sensory  hallucinations  which  have 
been  unquestionably  created  by  external  suggestion. 
A  third  point,  which,  if  ever  alluded  to  in  the  copious 
literature  of  the  subject,  has  escaped  my  notice,  is 
sexual  erethism,  an  occasional  sequel  of  this  form  of 
induced  unconsciousness,  as  it  frequently  is  a  result 
of  the  inhalation  of  nitrous  oxide  gas,  or  sulphuric 
ether  in  surgical  clinics.  A  glance  at  each  of  these 
suggestions  is  all  that  the  limits  of  the  discussion 
allow. 

As  to  the  testimony  of  the  senses.  It  has  been 
said  that  seeing  is  believing,  and  if  the  testimony 
of  the  senses  is  not  to  be  received,  our  courts 
of  justice  might  as  well  be  closed  at  once.  There 
is  truth  in  this,  but  not  the  whole  truth.  John 
Stuart  Mill  believed,  with  his  father,  in  the  sensuous 
origin  of  all  knowledge,  saying,  "  Nihil  in  intellectum 
quod  non  prius  in  sensu."  Dr.  Beard  went  to  the 
other  extreme,  and  said  that  "  Only  fools  trust  the 


84  A  Study  of  Trance. 

sight.  Seeing  is  n  ot  believing,  but  doubting,  for  what 
is  all  human  science  but  a  correcting  of  the  errors, 
and  a  supplementing  of  the  defects,  of  the  senses  ?" 
In  1884,  while  questioning  a  sensitive,  in  Boston,  as 
to  certain  illusion  s  created  by  my  suggestion,  and 
made  real  on  returning  to  the  normal  state,  I  re 
marked,  "  Would  you  take  your  oath  in  a  court  of 
justice  that  you  had  seen  these  objects  and  experi- 
enced these  sensation  s  ?"  "  Certainly,  I  would,"  was 
the  reply.  "  You  see  the  value  of  some  human  testi- 
mony," I  remarked  to  bystanders.  One  of  them 
chanced  to  be  Prof.  William  Jones,  M.  D.,  of  Harvard 
College.  This  accomplished  psychologist  has  re- 
cently made  valuable  contri  butions  to  physiological 
optics  and  showed  by  diagrams  how  illusory  certain 
spatial  distances  are,  even  to  one  in  the  normal  state. 
He  says,  that  the  "  facts  of  vision  form  a  jungle  of 
intricacy."  Only  culture,  experience  and  a  sound 
cerebrum  are  trustworthy  witnesses  of  visual  facts. 
"  The  whole  education  of  the  artist  consists  in  his 
learning  to  see  the  presented  signs  as  well  as  the  re- 
presented things." (9)  Helmholtz  shows  that  the  vitre- 
ous humor  always  holds  the  muscce  voliantes,  but 
they  are  not  noticed  till  some  lesion  is  suffered  and 
the  attention  drawn  to  them  as  to  a  new  discovery. 
The  fact  that  one  eye  has  become  blind  has  not  been 
noticed  for  some  time,  till  the  accidental  closure  of 
one  eye,  the  sound  one,  reveals  the  fact.  Volk- 
mann  0®  says  that  the  excitement  of  one  set  of  ret- 


Trance  Testimony  Worthless.  85 

inal  fibres  will  inhibit  the  function  of  another  set 
and  prevent  discrimination.  Still  further  retinal 
stimulation  may  restore  normal  vision.  "  Fallacies 
innumerable  exist  until  optical  discrimination  is 
educated  and  the  verdict  of  certain  chaotic  primitive 
sensations  is  corrected  by  a  larger  knowledge."  Prof. 
James  adds,  "In  the  matter  of  taste  it  seems  to  me 
that  more  men  are  normally  nearer  the  Trance  state 
than  in  respect  of  their  other  sensations.  Sugges- 
tion as  to  tasting,  influences  them  more  easily.  The 
peculiarity  of  the  trance  subject  is  that  all  emotions 
are  falsified  and  overpowered  by  the  imagination. 
In  all  men  some  sensations  are.  As  we  approach  the 
sense  of  hearing,  deceptions  abound."  In  experi- 
ments with  university  men,  students  of  his,  I  illus- 
trated, several  years  ago,  some  of  these  conclusions 
most  satisfactorily,  as  he  thought. 

The  argument  is  this :  If  there  may  be  a  sympa- 
thetic reproduction  of  ideas  in  another  while  he  is 
presumably  in  a  normal  condition,  may  there  not  be 
a  far  more  vivid  duplication  or  perversion  in  the 
mind  of  the  entranced  ?  If  optical  errors  deceive 
men  in  ordinary  experience,  may  not  psychological 
suggestions  mislead  when  extraordinary  influences 
bind  as  with  a  spell  ?  And  what  is  the  value  of  the 
testimony  of  those  who  are  thus  readily  thrown  out 
of  mental  equilibrium  ? 

Still  more  serious  is  the  query  when  it  is  moral  ac- 
curacy, rather  than  the  certitude  of  visual  or  gusta- 


86  A  Study  of  Trance. 

tory  experiences,  which  is  ;to  be  determined.  Visual 
errors  are  common  and  often  vexatious  and  embar- 
rassing, but  perversions  of  the  moral  sense  are  more 
perilous  to  the  individual  and  to  society.  A  letter 
from  Paris  to  a  New  York  periodical,  records  the  con- 
fession of  a  French  gendarme,  who  said  that  he  had 
committed  murder.  His  language  was,  "  Arrest  me  ! 
I  am  a  coward  and  murderer.  I  have  soiled  an  un- 
spotted life  by  an  odious  and  stupid  crime."  "  Why?" 
he  was  asked.  "I  do  not  know.  He  looked  at  me 
with  a  defiant  air.  I  did  not  know  him.  I  held  a 
knife  in  my  hand  and  drove  it  into  his  heart !  I 
heard  it  scrape  against  his  ribs  —mercy  !  mercy  ! " 
The  stalwart  officer  fainted.  The  man  was  the  sub- 
ject of  an  experiment.  One  of  the  professors  of  the 
Academy  of  Medicine  had  hypnotized  him,  given 
him  a  wooden  spatula,  calling  it  a  dagger,  and  point- 
ed out  a  tree  which  was  made  to  him  to  appear  as  an 
offensive  intruder.  He  was  told  to  stab  him  and  re- 
turn and  report  the  details,  which  he  did,  as  just  nar- 
rated. The  stealthy  approach  to  his  supposed  victim, 
his  wary,  anxious,  furtive  glances  to  see  if  he  was 
watched,  the  ghastly  pallor  of  face  and  agony  of 
tone  shown  in  the  confession  and  the  physical  col- 
lapse, as  well  as  the  difficulty  with  which  he  was 
afterward  ridden  of  the  impression  that  still  haunted 
him  like  the  nightmare,  attested  the  genuineness  of 
the  experiment.  Similar  cases  might  here  be  given 
where  persons,  laboring  under  delusions,  have  need- 


The  Medical  Expert.  87 

lessly  inculpated  themselves.  Grave  accusations 
against  others,  also,  are  made  of  acts  that  have  no 
existence  outside  their  own  disordered  fancy.  Inci- 
dents could  be  given  to  illustrate  the  erotic  as  well 
as  erratic  whims  which  are  created  by  hypnotism  in 
neurotic  females,  identical  with  the  aberrations  at- 
tendant on  the  use  of  anaesthetics.  Their  subjective 
sensations  are  to  them  objective  realities.  Their 
statement  is  intended  to  be  truthful,  but  as  legiti- 
mate evidence  it  is  worthless.  ai)  Their  dominant 
idea  is  well  called  by  Carlyle,  "diluted  Insanity." 
It  was  this  spectral  testimony  that  sent  thousands 
to  death  as  witches, 

"  In  courts  where  ghosts  appedr  as  witnesses, 
And  swear  men's  lives  away," 

on  the  principle  stated  in  Fatinitza,  "Flog  first! 
explanations  afterwards."  Shall  this  verruchtheit 
always  prevail  ? 

2. — Is  the  training  of  the  medical  expert  complete 
without  a  better  understanding  of  this  subject  ?  To 
state  the  question  is  to  answer  it.  There  are,  indeed, 
few  who  are  alike  familiar  with  the  principles  of 
legal  and  medical  science.  One  man  rarely  masters 
two  professions  in  all  their  details.  But  may  not  the 
training  in  each,  law  and  medicine,  be  so  broadened 
as  to  embrace  a  fuller  knowledge  of  the  profound 
truths  of  psychology  ?  Can  the  perplexing  questions 
which  arise,  as  well  in  our  civil  courts  as  in  the 


88  A  Study  of  Trance. 

higher,  be  fairly  met  without  a  better  acquaintance 
with  the  border-land  of  Insanity  in  which  so  many 
live  ?  Is  not  the  prevailing  ignorance  on  this  sub- 
ject the  frequent  cause  of  popular  and  professional 
jealousy  and  dislike  with  reference  to  expert  testi- 
mony ? 

An  English  judge  has  recently  suppressed  the 
expression  of  a  medical  man's  opinion,  about  to  be 
offered  in  evidence  on  an  insanity  plea,  and  given 
notice  that  in  every  future  case  he  will  deal  with  all 
medical  and  scientific  experts  in  the  same  way. 
They  may  simply  say  what  they  saw  and  heard,  but 
give  110  opinion.  "  For  a  man  to  have  close  and 
intimate  practical  knowledge  of  some  part  of  the 
field  of  science  is,  in  some  quarters,  apparently  a 
reason  why  his  deliberately  formed  opinion  on  a  sub- 
ject within  the  sphere  of  his  studies  should  be  sup- 
pressed in  a  court  of  law,  and  the  point  of  issue  be 
decided  by  untrained  minds.  Carry  this  to  its  logical 
conclusion,  and  we  must  set  up  ignorance  as  a  chief 
qualification  of  those  fitted  to  decide  scientific  ques- 
tions." <K> 

It  is  not  strange  that  the  editor  quoted,  calls  for 
some  public  authority  outside  to  initiate  a  change, 
in  view  of  such  inexplicable  ruling. 

3. — May  not  malingering  among  the  insane  be 
sooner  detected  by  the  application  of  the  facts  of 
the  Involuntary  Life  ? 

The   simulation  of  diseases    and    disabilities  is  a 


The  Malingerer.  89 

common  occurrence,  met  with  by  all  who  have  their 
fellow-men  in  durance.  Subjective  symptoms  are 
very  misleading,  as  the  testimony  of  officers  of  pri- 
sons and  asylums  will  show.  A  military  deserter  to 
escape  punishment  remained  apparently  unconsci- 
ous for  more  than  two  months.  <J3> 

Beck  and  Gavin  tell  of  others  whose  pretended  in- 
sensibility was  not  detected  by  aloes  in  the  mouth, 
shower-bath  or  electricity.  Only  the  actual  cautery 
intimidated.  Somnambulism  has  been  feigned  to 
cover  crime,  or  to  excite  pity ;  so,  also,  deaf -mutism, 
paralysis,  contractures,  heemorrhagic  and  cutaneous 
changes.  Recent  experiments  on  himself  by  Dr. 
Ossip  Feldman  of  Russia,  before  the  Medico-Legal 
Society,  demonstrate  the  power  of  acceleration  and 
retardation  of  the  heart's  action  within  wide  bounds, 
possessed  by  some  skilful  experimenters.  The  sphy- 
mograph  alone  is  an  insufficient  guide  or  test  in  de- 
tecting the  malingerer.  The  myograph,  as  used  by 
Charcot,  is  more  satisfactory,  particularly  in  hys- 
terical traumatic  contractures.  But  mechanical  ap- 
pliances are  only  decisive  in  the  hands  of  those  who 
understand  the  normal  and  aberrant  features  of 
human  thought  and  feeling.  Science  demands  the 
severest  scrutiny  of  all  phenomena,  and  the  elimina- 
tion of  every  possible  element  of  fraud,  deliberate  or 
unconscious. 

Six  sources  of  error  have  been  signalized  into 
which  investigators  are  likely  to  fall.  <u>  The  first, 


90  A  Study  of  Trance. 

the  overlooking  of  those  interactions  of  mind  and 
body  below  the  plane  of  volition  and  consciousness. 
Secondly,  the  innocent  self-deception,  of  the  subject 
experimented  on.  A  knowledge  of  Trance  is  indis- 
pensable to  detect  self-imposition.  Counter-decep- 
tion is  advised ;  that  is,  doing  nothing  when  some- 
thing is  expected  :  doing  something  when  nothing  is 
expected,  and  doing  something  different  from  what 
the  sensitive  believes  is  being  done.  Deliberate  de- 
ception, the  third  source  of  error,  is  to  be  met  in  the 
same  way.  Intended  and  unintentional  collusion  of 
third  parties  forms  two  more  sources,  and  the  over- 
looking of  the  element  of  chance  and  coincidence  is 
the  sixth. 

The  question  of  the  detection  of  malingering  is 
really  a  corollary  of  the  previous  one,  the  training  of 
medical  experts  as  witnesses  in  legal  trials.  This 
brief  allusion  is  sufficient  to  show  its  commanding 
importance.  Reviewing  the  clinical  and  forensic 
facts  considered  in  reference  to  Trance  we  now  ask  : 

4. — Is  there  need  of  any  legal  surveillance  in 
private  experiments  or  public  exhibitions  ?  Civil 
authorities  have,  in  foreign  cities,  occasionally  re- 
stricted or  prohibited  them,  and  the  British  Medical 
Journal  for  March  3,  speaking  of  the  artificial 
Trance,  while  crediting  it  with  curative  results  in 
hysteria,  adds,  "a  far  more  serious  and  thorny 
question  is  that  which  bears  on  the  medico-legal 
aspect.  The  impairment  of  volition  which  results 


An  Inquisitorial  Agent.  91 

from  repeated  induction  of  this  condition  is  a  factor 
of  which  the  law  ought  to  take  cognizance. "  Tem- 
porary insanity  has  sometimes  followed  injudicious 
experiments  and  exciting  concomitants,  particularly 
where  an  unskilled  operator  loses  his  own  self-pos- 
session. Q® 

As  Trance  has  been  invoked,  and  used  successfully, 
in  the  control,  if  not  eradication,  of  vicious  appetites, 
it  is  quite  possible  to  impart  permanent  tastes  for 
persons,  objects  and  indulgencies,  good  or  evil,  and 
to  intensify  the  same  by  repetition.  This  is  but  a 
hint  of  the  amazing  perils  and  possibilities  of  a  de- 
veloping science.  It  also  gives  emphasis  to  the  query 
as  to  any  special  custody  in  which  parties  should  be 
held  who  are  related  as  experimenter  and  subject. 

"  He  touches  heaven  who  lays  his  hand  upon  a 
human  frame,"  says  an  enthusiastic  German  writer; 
but  he  gets  near  to  the  Creator  who  knows  how  to 
evoke,  direct,  control  and  utilize  these  marvelous 
psychic  phenomena  in  the  service  of  humanity. 

5. — Is  it  justifiable  to  use  this  condition  as  an  in- 
quisitorial agent  ?  The  revivication  of  memory  in 
the  exaltation  of  Trance,  constitutes  what  has  been 
called  "an  artificial  Day  of  Judgment."  Through 
inquiry  and  suggestion  the  mind  is  steered  along  a 
labyrinth  of  bygone  events,  names,  places  and  dates. 
''Crimes  are  revealed  in  this  condition,  even  dating 
back  to  early  childhood.  We  have  absolute  control 
of  the  subject,  and  absolutely  demonstrative  experi- 


92  A  Study  of  Trance. 

ments  of  the  genuineness  of  these  Trance-Confessions 
can  be  made."  Detectives  have  availed  themselves 
of  the  confessions  of  the  intoxicated,  and  alienists 
have  profitably  studied  the  insane  while  asleep.  The 
query  suggested  by  these  facts  is  this:  Is  it  justifiable 
to  take  advantage  of  a  person  in  this  abnormal  state 
and  lead  him  to  inculpate  himself,  if  suspected  of 
wrong  doing  ? 

6. — A  final  question  remains:  Is  any  revision  of 
the  Penal  Code  desirable  in  view  of  the  facts  which 
the  present  scientific  study  of  this  matter  has  elicit- 
ed ?  This  carries  us  back  to  the  initial  and  germinal 
idea  of  the  whole  discussion,  the  relation  of  Auto- 
matism to  Responsibility.  It  is  an  ethical  as  well  as 
a  physiological  question.  It  is  related  to  the  pro- 
found problem  of  Criminal  Anthropology;  and  so 
comes  within  the  scope  of  legislation.  Is  man  only 
an  automaton  ?  Has  consciousness — the  self -recog- 
nition of  the  ego — any  causative  relation  to  physical 
action  ?  Have  volitions  any  power,  or  was  Emerson 
mistaken  in  saying  that  "  Thoughts  rule  the  world  ?" 
We  all  admit  the  fact  of  an  acquired  automatism,  the 
product  of  habit,  a  second  nature  as  it  is  called,  but 
is  there,  or  is  there  not,  a  self -determining  power  of 
the  will  ?  Do  the  phenomena  of  the  Involuntary  Life 
show  man  to  be  irresponsible  ?  It  is  believed  that 
the  bulk  of  men,  if  not  all,  are  susceptible ;  that  is, 
they  would  or  could  enter  Trance  under  favorable 
conditions.  Does  this — assuming  it  to  be  a  fact — 


A  Copious  Theme.  93 

militate  against  the  freedom  of  the  will  ?  And  are 
those  who  recognize  their  special  susceptibility  and 
admit  their  frequent  surrendry  of  consciousness  and 
volition,  in  experimental  tests,  to  be  regarded  with 
any  more  favor  or  consideration  before  the  law  than 
are  the  victims  of  strong  drink  ?  Is  this  suscepti- 
bility to  Trance  strictly  a  disease,  or  akin  to  In- 
sanity ?  If  so,  the  acts  of  the  entranced  come  to  be, 
in  some  sense,  those  of  irresponsible  agents. 

The  subject  is  copious,  but  it  is  time  to  say  with 
Virgil's  shepherd,  "  Claudite  jam  rivos  pueri  ;  sat 
prata  biberunt."  The  further  we  explore  this  wonder- 
land, the  more  abundant  and  alluring  does  the  wealth 
of  material  become.  This  paper  is  but  a  hint  of  what 
is  left  unsaid. 

As  Columbus  caught  sight  of  the  Orinoco,  he  ex- 
claimed: "This  river  flows  not  from  an  island,  but 
from  a  continent ! "  He  was  right.  That  stream 
drains  650,000  square  miles,  and  receives  the  water 
of  nearly  three  thousand  tributaries.  It  is  a  fit  sym- 
bol of  the  opulence  of  that  vast  and  comparatively 
unknown  continent  of  truth  which  Psychology  has 
begun  to  explore.  We  have  hardly  passed  the  port- 
als. "  A  great  and  effectual  door  is  opened  to  us  and 
there  are  many  adversaries,"  with  not  a  few  diffi- 
culties to  overcome.  But  Science  is  unabashed. 
Slowly,  yet  surely  onward  she  makes  her  solemn 
journey  into  this  land  of  maze  and  mystery. 


94  A  Study  of  Trance. 

(1)  Medical  Legal  Soc.  Papers,  Vol.  III.,  p.  360. 

(2)  Duke  of  Argyle,  Chap.  VII.,  Reign  of  Law. 

(3)  Joel  Prentiss  Bishop. 

(4)  Coke,  VIII.,  25. 

(5)  Thwing's  Handbook  of  Anthropology.     Proceedings  Am<!ric:in 
Institute  Christian  Philosophy,  1884-5. 

(G)  Nature  of  Trance.     Beard.     Putnam's  Sons,  New  York. 

(7)  Smith's  Bible  Dictionary. 

(8)  NOTES  RELATIONS  ON  MAGNETISM. 

(9)  Mind,  October,  1887,  also  Lotze  and  LIPPOS. 

(10)  Under  suchung  en. 

(11)  Hamilton's  Medical  Jurisprudeuce,  p.  493. 

(12)  British  Medical  Journal,  March  3,  1888,  p.  477. 

(13)  Edinburgh  Annual  Register,  Vol.  IV. 

(14)  Popular  Science  Monthly,  March  and  April,  1879. 

(15)  "Subjects  are  generally  not  injured,  physically,   but  benefited 
by  the  habit  of  going  into  artificial  trance ;  but  there  are  exceptions* 
especially  with  those  who  develop  the  phenomena  of  trance-seeing. 
Suicide  can  be  committed  by  persons  in  any  of  the  natural  forms  of 
Trance.     It  is  possible  for  the  operator  to  rob  a  trance-subject  while  in 
trance-sleep,  or  kill  him,  or  to  inflict  any  injury  upon  him  whatsoever. 
He  can  compel  him  to  commit  suicide  at  a  definite  time,  several  min- 
utes in  advance ;  meanwhile,  the  operator  can  get  out  of  the  way.     Ha 
can  cause  him  to  sign  documents,  or  to  transfer  property,  or  to  make  a 
•will.     When  two  persons  are  in  trance  they  can  be  made  to  fight  a 
duel.     The  responsibility  in  all  these  cases  rests  with  the  operator,  and 
no  new  laws  are  needed. "    Dr.  G.  M.  Beard. 

It  may  be  added  that  this  inexplicable  witchery  over  their  fellows 
is  exerted  by  men  and  by  women  in  the  ordinary  intercourse  of  life; 
in  business,  as  well  as  in  other  relations.  A  bird  charmed  by  a  snake 
is  no  more  powerless  than  are  some  souls  in  the  toils  of  adroit  schemers. 
And  what  is  love,  sometimes,  other  than  delirium?  "Amantes, 
amentes." 


THE  BASIS  OF  REMEDIAL 

SCIENCE. 


A  Lecture  delivered  at  the  New  Jersey  Medical  College. 
At  the  opening-  of  the  Spring  Term,  1889. 


Remedial  science  is  the  scientific  study  and  appli- 
cation of  remedial  methods  to  the  individual  and 
social  needs  of  human  life.  It  is  a  study,  theoretic, 
tentative,  experimental.  Erastus  Darwin  said  to 
Edgewood:  "A  fool  is  one  who  has  never  made  an 
experiment,"  a  trenchant  way  of  expressing  the 
necessities  of  initial  science.  What  is  legislation 
but  a  series  of  attempts  to  adjust  the  relations  of 
society,  from  the  simplest,  archaic  conditions,  down 
to  the  present  complex  civilization  of  our  age  ? 
Through  what  constant  revisions  has  statutory  and 
unwritten  law  passed,  as  varying  needs  require. 
What  a  kaleidoscope  of  brilliant  and  ever-shifting 
thought  does  philosophy  present.  So  with  philan- 
thropic endeavor.  Man  is  the  same,  but  the  prob- 
lems of  want  and  waste,  the  leakage  and  drainage 
of  society,  present  new  features  every  century.  Be 


96  The  Basis  of  Remedial  Science. 

medial  methods,   therefore,    must   change  with  the 
changing  conditions  and  environments  of  men. 

But  Remedial  Science  is  more  than  a  study.  It  is 
the  practical  application  of  accredited  means  to  an 
end,  the  individual  and  social  needs  of  human  life. 

Furthermore,  it  has  to  do  with  both  the  actual  and 
the  possible  life  of  every  man.  It  is  not  only  anti- 
dotal, but  preventive.  It  conserves  the  good,  while  it 
remedies  the  evil.  .There  is  wisdom  in  relief,  and 
prescience  in  forefending  ill.  Deterrent  as  well  as 
curative  methods  are  used;  anticipative  as  well  as 
restorative.  To  thwart  disaster,  to  preclude  loss,  is 
better  than  to  palliate  and  repair  Thus  Remedial 
Science  has  to  do  with  the  future,  as  well  as  with  the 
present  exigencies  of  society.  Its  scope  is  broad  and 
its  work  humane.  The  basis  should  be  ample. 

PSYCHOLOGICAL  SCIENCE  is  the  true  foundation. 
Man  is  the  unchanging  factor.  His  nature  and 
needs,  the  physical  and  psychic  elements  that  enter 
into  his  constitution,  his  capacities  and  possibilities, 
the  normal  and  aberrant  conditions  of  soul  which 
go  to  make  his  responsibility  or  irresponsibility 
heredity  and  many  other  medico-legal  problems  lie 
at  the  basis  of  any  intelligent  scheme  of  relief. 
Take,  for  example,  the  industrial  problems  which  to- 
day are  among  the  most  intricate  and  perplexing  of 
any  that  tax  the  thought  of  legislators  and  reform- 
ers. Volumes  are  written  on  capital,  labor,  the  law 
of  supply  and  demand,  the  changing  values  of  money 


Educational  Science.  97 

and  merchandize,  while  the  one,  unchanging  factor 
is  almost  wholly  overlooked,  the  MAN  himself,  his 
nature,  needs,  possibilities,  the  foundation  facts 
of  Psychology  which  enter  into  all  questions  of  in- 
dustrial and  social  reform.  Some  persons  blindly 
clamor  for  a  uniform  division  of  wealth.  Let  the 
spendthrift  and  the  toiler,  the  drudge  and  the  drone 
share  alike.  Were  such  a  division  made  to-day,  and 
all  pecuniary  distinction  levelled,  a  new  division 
would  be  demanded  to-morrow,  for  the  ineradicable 
facts  of  human  nature  remain.  The  thrifty  will  be 
thrifty  still,  and  the  lazy  will  be  lazy  still.  Till  man 
be  understood,  these  revolutionary  theories  only 
illustrate  an  ignorance  as  profound  as  it  is  auda- 
cious. 

Look  at  Educational  Science.  A  multitude  of 
divergent  social  tendencies  are  seen,  represent- 
ing varying  feelings,  tastes  and  opinions.  These 
are  so  variable  that  Herbert  Spencer  suggests 
a  diagram  to  indicate  their  rise  and  fall,  after  the 
manner  of  an  unstable,  panicky  stock  market. 
"  Men  pair  off  in  insane  parties,"  says  Emerson.  So- 
cial conditions  undergo  a  continual  metamorphosis, 
but  man  remains  the  central  problem,  aft^r  all. 
The  personal  equation  takes  precedence.  In  the  deli- 
cate manipulations  of  the  telescope  and  in  the  record 
of  astronomical  observations,  each  operator  is  ex- 
amined individually,  to  determine  the  nicety  of  his 
auditory  and  visual  impressions  and  the  celerity  of 


98  The  Basis  of  Remedial  Science. 

his  manual  touch.  Each  man  is  registered.  Men 
vary  among  themselves .  The  condition  of  the  same 
operator,  also,  varies  as  the  days  go  by,  and  his  re- 
cord is  continually  subject  to  revision.  So  is  it  with 
all  the  mental  measurements  with  which  educational 
science  has  to  do.  Superficial  teachers  and  mechan- 
ical book  makers  are  ignorant  of  those  occult  affini- 
ties and  subterranean  avenues  of  spiritual  life  which 
are  familiar  to  adroit  masters  of  men.  Their  text- 
books and  teachings  are  the  same  for  all  minds. 
They  have  but  one  Procrustean  bed.  But  the  wise 
moulder  of  mind  recognizes  each  diversity  of  taste 
and  temper.  He  aims  to  transfuse  and  not  merely 
to  transfer.  Shelley  fainted  when  "  Christabel "  was 
read.  This  work  of  Coleridge  stimulated  Sir  Walter 
Scott  to  write  "  The  Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel."  But 
many  a  stolid  critic  has  doubtless  said  of  this  poem, 
as  the  mathematician  said  of  " Paradise  Lost,"  "I 
see  nothing  attractive  in  it,  for  it  proves  nothing." 
Buffon  tells  us  that  he  would  sit  fourteen  hours  a 
day  at  his  desk  in  a  state  of  transport,  so  fluent  and 
affluent  was  his  creative  genius.  The  thoughts  of 
other  students  struggling  for  egress  are  like  men 
buried  alive,  who  beat  their  coffin  lids  in  vain.  It  is 
as  true  in  educational  science  as  in  therapeutics,  that 
Corpora  non  agunt  nisi  soluta.  The  author  and 
teacher  must  merge  their  very  life  in  their  teachings, 
"  as  gold  lost  in  Corinthian  brass,  leaving  no  separate 
monumental  trace  of  its  influence,  added  color, 


Psychology  and  Medicine.  99 

weight  and  worth  to  the  metal  into  which  it  melted." 
An  intelligent  reception  of  the  principles  of  practical 
psychology  would  give  an  immeasurable  impulse  to 
educational  science. 

So  with  Medicine.  Voltaire  said  that  a  doctor  was 
a  man  who  poured  drugs,  of  which  he  knew  little, 
into  a  body  of  which  he  knew  less.  Nature  and  dis- 
ease have  been  compared  to  two  men  fighting,  and 
the  physician,  a  blind  man  who  joins  in  the  fray.  He 
hits  sometimes  one  and  sometimes  the  other.  This 
is  hardly  a  burlesque  on  our  empiricism.  Professor 
Tyndall  says  that  medicine  has  not  been  a  science 
till  recently.  It  has  only  been  a  collection  of  empir- 
ical rules,  interpreted  according  to  the  sagacity  of 
each  physician.  Professor  Huxley  makes  a  similar 
remark  in  regard  to  pathology,  the  foundation  of 
which  is  physiology.  Harvey's  De  motu  cordis 
marked  the  twilight  dawn.  Modern  microscopy 
marks  approaching  noon ;  but  it  is  Psychology  alone 
that  is  to  give  plenary  significance  to  the  beautitude 
of  Hippocrates,  "  That  physician  who  is  also  a  phil- 
osopher is  Godlike."  We  must  treat  the  patient  as 
well  as  the  disease,  taking  the  entire  man  into  ac- 
count, the  soul  as  well  as  the  spleen.  Oftentimes 
the  whole  trouble  is  imaginitis,  as  a  student  of  Long 
Island  College  Hospital  well  termed  it.  The  imagi- 
nation kills.  It  may  cure.  It  has,  therefore,  its  place 
in  Mental  Therapeutics. 

Were  illustrations  in  another  field  of  thought  need- 


100  The  Basis  of  Remedial  Science. 

ed,  we  might  refer  to  Theological  Science.  A  cen- 
tury ago,  the  battle  of  Christianity  with  Infidelity 
was  fought  out  on  the  line  of  metaphysical  specula- 
tions, with  the  bows  and  arrows  of  obsolete  warfare, 
as  Hugh  Miller  has  said.  But  the  field  and  the  wea- 
pons are  now  changed.  Combatants  stand  in  a  new 
arena.  Challengers  choose  their  own  methods  of  as- 
sault. What  now  is  needed,  as  Martineau  has  said, 
is  "a  living  faith,  true  to  the  conscience,  true  to  the 
intellect  and  true  to  the  realized  science  of  the  day." 
We  are  to  study  men,  not  as  abstractions,  but  in  ac- 
tual life.  We  do  not  go  to  the  cloister  and  medieval 
manuscripts  to  formulate  the  powers  and  possibilities 
of  the  soul,  but  to  the  psychological  laboratory,  to  the 
lecture-room,  the  clinic  and  to  the  highways  and  by- 
ways, as  well;  indeed,  wherever  human  life  in  its 
normal  or  aberrant  features  may  be  studied.  By  this 
practical  inspection  of  the  soul's  activity  in  its  every 
day  forth-puttings,  in  its  struggles,  successes  and 
failures,  we  come  to  a  knowledge  of  man  that  can 
never  be  found  in  books  alone.  Consciousness,  the 
inarticulate  depths  that  are  beneath  human  speech, 
the  basis  of  identity,  the  existence  and  limitations  of 
the  will,  individual  responsibility,  and  other  vital  co- 
efficients of  our  moral  being  are  to  be  measured  and 
mated  in  the  light  of  the  "realized  science  of  to-day." 
Mere  dogmatism  or  medieval  mysticism  will  no 
longer  avail.  Quiddities  and  sophistries  and  all  illu- 
sory introspections  must  be  brought  face  to  face  with 


Criminal  Anthropology.  101 

the  ultimate  and  irreducible  facts  of  individual  ex- 
perience, and  actual  life.  From  these  there  is  no 
appeal.  :  -  -  -  . 

A  professor  exhibiting  .certain  \  chemical ,  experi- 
ments before  his  sovereign,  belittled  himself  and  the 
austere  nobility  of  science  by  saying:  "  These  gases 
will  now  have  the  honor  to  unite  before  your  Royal 
Highness."  Science  is  not  a  sycophant.  It  deals  in 
frozen  facts  and  speaks  in  no  servile  or  hesitating 
tones.  It  is  a  leveller  and  iconoclast.  Sciolism  may 
stoop,  but  Science  cannot.  Its  other  name  is  TRUTH. 

The  studies  of  the  department  which  I  have  been 
unexpectedly  called  to  conduct  in  this  Medical  Col- 
lege comprehend  Nervous  Diseases.  No  theme  in 
the  whole  curriculum  is  broader.  None  assumes  so 
grave  importance.  In  a  paper  read  before  one  of  the 
medical  societies  of  London,  in  1887,  on  "American 
Life  as  related  to  Inebriety,"  I  have  particularized 
some  features  of  our  social,  civic  and  political  life,  as 
well  as  the  psychic  and  physical  factors  of  the  Amer- 
ican himself,  which  help  to  make  this  land  "The  In- 
temperate Belt,"  as  it  is  called.  Your  attention  is 
directed  to  that  discussion. 

Criminal  Anthropology  is  another  ancillary  theme. 
Human  life  in  its  criminal  aspects  opens  a  vast  con- 
tinent of  thought.  The  territory  is  almost  boundless, 
coterminous  as  it  is  with  that  of  human  responsi- 
bility. Man  in  his  relations  to  crime  involves  a  study 


102  The  Basis  of  Remedial  Science. 

of  his  normal  and  diseased  conditions,  of  his  social 
and  ethnic  relations  as  well.  Physical  and  metaphy- 
sical aspects,  clinical  and  forensic,  the  moral  and  his- 
torical bearings  of  the,  subject  need  to  be  made  fa- 
miliar to  you. 

1.  The  Psychic  investigation  of  human  crime  will 
unfold  at  its  initial  point  the  existence  of  a  will,  and 
determine  the  degree  of  freedom  which  that  will  en- 
joys. What  is  the  physical  basis  of  the  will  ?  Do 
purely  bodily  functions  run  parallel  to  the  rudiments 
of  volition  and  practically  become  their  physiological 
equivalents  ?  Maudsley  has  shown  that  the  nervous 
system  can  execute  purposeful  acts,  through  the 
muscles,  without  the  intervention  of  the  will  or  even 
consciousness.  An  infant  born  without  a  brain  has 
sucked  a  finger  put  between  its  lips.  Similar  move- 
ments of  aggression,  of  defence  and  of  pleasure-seek- 
ing have  been  also  obtained  by  Goltz  from  a  headless 
frog.  Consciousness  is  said  to  have  not  one-tenth 
part  .of  the  function  it  is  usually  assumed  to  have 
in  the  ordinary  mental  operations  of  each  waking 
hour. 

Then  we  must  consider  the  interactions  of  the 
plastic  and  functional  sides  of  brain  life ;  the  nutri- 
tive and  the  disruptive,  in  which  action  it  is  claimed 
that  all  phenomena  have  determining  conditions  in 
an  antecedent  state  of  the  body.  This  seems  to  mili- 
tate against  free  choice.  It  is  a  point  of  great  im- 
portance as  related  to  the  responsibility  of  man. 


Perversions  of  the  Will.  103 

Then,  again,  we  must  understand  better  the  parallel- 
ism between  these  physiological  processes  revealed 
by  the  senses  and  the  psychological  learned  through 
consciousness.  Spinoza  says  that  brain  is  visible 
mind  and  the  mind  is  invisible  brain.  Passing  from 
these  theories  of  the  normal  will  and  of  normal  con- 
sciousness, physically  and  metaphysically  viewed, 
we  take  up  the  pathological  side  of  the  subject  and 
examine  the  perversions  of  the  will,  the  disintegra- 
tion or  degeneracy  of  moral  sensibility.  This  is 
sometimes  congenital,  as  in  the  case  of  Pomroy,  the 
boy  fiend,  and  others  like  him;  or  that  of  the  idiot, 
noted  by  Morel,  who  enjoyed  funerals  so  well  that  he 
killed  a  fellow-patient  to  furnish  material;  or  that  of 
another,  at  Earlswood  Asylum,  who  himself  sat  smil- 
ing while  the  surgeon  tore  his  nail  off.  This  physi- 
cal and  moral  torpor  is  also  the  result  of  disease,  as 
in  various  forms  of  insanity,  where,  for  the  time,  all 
co-ordination  of  function  seems  lost.  It  is  also  arti- 
ficially produced,  as  in  the  hypnotic  trance,  where 
there  is  no  lesion  in  nerve  centers  or  any  structural 
disorder,  but  a  general  anaesthesia,  yet  vivid  respon- 
siveness to  outward  impressions  and  suggestions. 

It  is  unquestionably  true,  as  Maudsley  states  ("  Body 
and  Will,"  p.  273),  that  the  impairment  of  will  goes  on 
through  generations  by  the  effects  of  vice  and  dis- 
ease, and  that  this  has  been  too  often  overlooked, 
both  in  the  penal  and  the  reformatory  methods  in 
vogue.  The  umbilical  cord  that  binds  us  all  to  the 


104  The  Basis  of  Remedial  Science. 

past  is  not  easily  cut.   The  solidarity  of  races,  peoples 
and  families  is  a  solemn,  stern  and  stubborn  fact. 

But  it  is  also  true  (ibid,  295)  that  whatever  our  in- 
heritance of  ideas  and  impulses  may  be,  whatever 
these  hidden  molecular  conditions  of  blood  and  brain 
are,  "a  similar  condition  of  the  nervous  system  is 
brought  about  sometimes  by  special  nerve-enerva- 
ting causes — a  mutinous  movement  we  call  choreic,  a 
kind  of  St.  Vitus'  dance  of  the  idea  or  impulse — a 
functional  dissolution  of  the  mental  organism,  the 
consequence  of  which  is  a  disintegration  of  will." 
These  and  kindred  themes  of  Psychology  lead  at 
once  to  Sociology. 

2. — In  the  study  of  Criminal  Anthropology  we 
must  exhibit  not  only  the  normal  factors  of  a  sound, 
healthful,  social  life,  but  the  disintegrating  and  in- 
fectious elements,  as  well,  which  are  working  out  a 
fatal  decomposition.  The  latter  are  more  destruc- 
tive and  virulent  where  social  conditions  are  as 
unique  as  our  own  to-day.  Civilization  is  complex, 
intricate,  delicate,  full  of  perplexing  and  embar- 
rassing relations.  Our  methods  of  meeting  them, 
whether  punitive  or  philanthropic  and  remedial, 
must  be  correspondingly  elaborate,  minute  and 
sagacious. 

The  biological  study  of  crime,  already  hinted  at,  is 
but  auxiliary  and  introductory  to  its  sociological. 
Our  age  is  one  of  feverish  intensity.  The  stolidity, 
sterility  and  immobility  of  oriental  peoples  find  here 


Medical  Jurisprudence.  105 

a  startling  contrast  in  the  tumultuous  vitality  of 
modern  society.  We  move  in  no  ancestral  grooves, 
but  our  business  is  a  scene  of  ceaseless  agitation, 
"an  Atlantic  storm  which  scarce  knows  repose.  We 
buy,  we  sell,  we  tear  down,  we  build  up ;  we  put 
girdles  round  the  globe,  as  if  time  were  but  an  hour, 
and  eternal  destiny  hung  upon  these  material  issues. 
Every  day  of  the  year  somebody's  brain  reels.  In- 
sanity is  part  of  the  price  we  pay  for  our  Western 
civilization."  So  says  Dr.  J.  O.  Putnam,  at  the  Buf- 
falo State  Asylum.  It  is  the  work  of  the  Sociologist 
to  collect  data  in  the  fields  of  social  and  political 
science,  and  formulate  principles  for  legislative  and 
individual  action,  and  in  no  matter  more  dilligently 
than  in  penology  and  related  topics.  The  whole  field 
of  Medical  Jurisprudence  is  opened  by  this  subject. 
We  are  to  determine,  for  example,  the  equipment  of  a 
competent  medical  expert,  and  the  medico-legal  re- 
lations of  Insanity,  Suicide,  Dipsomania,  Klepto- 
mania, Epilepsy  and  many  simulated  diseases. 
Malingerers  are  found  outside  the  prison  and  hos- 
pital among  sailors,  soldiers,  workmen  shirking  toil, 
rogues  who  prey  upon  our  sympathy,  or  thieves  on 
our  property.  They  understand  their  business.  They 
sometimes  deceive  the  very  elect.  Gavin  in  his 
"Feigned  Diseases,"  records  many  cases,  and  the 
late  Dr.  George  M.  Beard  in  Popular  Science  Monthly, 
April  1879,  has  given  timely  suggestions  as  to  cir- 
cumventing fraud.  There  are  a  multitude  of  other 


106  The  Basis  of  Remedial  Science. 

ancillary  topics :  Heredity,  Marriage,  Parentage,  In- 
heritance of  Ideas,  Sanitary  Science,  the  Ethics  of 
Architecture,  Climatic  Conditions,  Rural  and  Civic 
Life  compared,  Immigration  and  Industrial  Prob- 
lems. 

3. — We  have,  finally,  the  historical  relations  of 
crime;  racial  tendencies  to  trace,  and  comparisons 
between  different  periods  and  peoples,  in  which 
study  the  Archaeologist  is  an  indispensible  ally.  The 
collection  of  crania  by  the  Anthropological  Congress 
at  Home,  of  handwriting  and  photographs  at  Paris, 
of  the  whole  paraphernalia  of  crime;  ancient  and 
modern,  now  scattered  in  many  foreign  museums, 
are  hints  of  the  illustrative  material  available  and 
helpful  in  the  systematic  and  scientific  study  of  this 
unique  and  opulent  department  of  Medico-Legal 
Science. 

In  conclusion,  fellow  students,  a  word  as  to  the 
collateral  branch  of  this  department,  "Mental  Thera- 
peutics," or,  as  Bernheim  calls  it,  "Suggestive  Thera- 
peutics." This  makes  conspicuous  the  personal 
equation  on  which  all  Remedial  Science  is  founded. 
The  man,  as  well  as  the  malady,  is  to  be  treated. 
His  own  mind  is  to  be  regarded  as  oftentimes  a  more 
potential  ally  than  the  diet  or  drug.  This  simple 
axiom  is  to  be  presented,  cleared  of  the  mystery  and 
quackery  with  which  ignorance  and  cupidity  have 
invested  it.  There  is  a  treatment  in  which  neither 
Christianity  nor  Science  is  found,  though  it  claims 


The  Mind  a  Factor.  107 

both.  There  are  Faith  Cures  in  which  faith  in  God 
has  really  little  to  do.  There  are  thaumaturgists  of 
all  sorts,  by  which  multitudes  are  led  astray.  It  will 
be  your  vocation  as  medical  men  to  disengage  truth 
from  rubbish,  and  exalt  the  sacred  art  of  healing  to 
the  position  it  deserves.  You  are  to  study  your  pa- 
tients as  well  as  their  ailments.  Very  many  of 
these  are  imaginary  ills.  Even  in  real  disease  the 
mind  itself  is  a  chief  factor.  Lecturing  on  tonics, 
Professor  McCorkle,  of  Brooklyn,  says,  "The  best 
tonic  that  you  can  carry  into  the  sick  room  is 
HOPE.  Dwelling  on  one's  disease  brings  about  func- 
tional and  pathological  changes,  but  hope  is  better 
than  quinine."  In  its  normal  condition  the  body  is 
affected  by  the  emotions.  It  is  even  more  tyran- 
nized by  them  when  diseased.  This  is  true  quite  as 
often  in  male  as  in  female  patients — 64  to  36  is  the 
ratio  of  cases  reported  by  Dr.  Tuke.  Expectation  is 
an  ally  of  amazing  power.  Professor  Gerbi  cured 
401  out  of  629  cases  of  odontalgia  through  this 
agency.  We  often  say,  "It  is  only  the  imagina- 
tion;" but  the  imagination  kills  and  it  cures.  We 
are  not  to  despise  or  minimize  its  power. 

Nor  are  we  to  reject  as  impossible  other  occult 
processes  which  we  are  at  present  unable  to  explain. 
Sir  Benjamin  Brodie  thinks  it  probable  that  our 
nervous  force  is  some  modification  of  the  force  that 
produces  electricity  and  magnetism.  Oxygenized 
blood  may  act  on  the  cortex  as  acid  on  voltaic  plates . 


108  The  Basis  of  Remedial  Science. 

To  deny  is  not  to  disprove.  Dr.  Tuke  has  well  said, 
' '  There  is  such  a  thing  as  a  scientific  snob.  It  is  he 
who  is  quite  certain  that  he  has  fathomed  the  depth 
of  the  great  ocean  of  knowledge,  and  can  guage  the 
spheres  with  the  measure  which  he  carries  in  his 
pocket." 

For  nearly  a  score  of  years  it  has  been  an  exhiler- 
ating  work  to  meet,  from  time  to  time,  in  our  pre- 
paratory and  professional  schools,  eager  and  in- 
quisitive minds,  and  to  lead  them  in  branches  of 
knowledge  familiar  to  my  thought.  The  themes 
now  before  us  in  this  College  and  in  this  department 
are  alluring  in  their  scientific  and  humane  aspects. 
I  could  wish  myself  better  prepared  to  handle  them, 
but  shall  rely. alike  upon  your  considerate  indulg- 
ence and  your  kind  co-operation. 


THE  MYSTERY  AND  MASTERY 

OF  MEN. 


An  Address  delivered  November  11,  1884,  before  the  American  Institute 
of  Phrenology,  New  York  City. 


Did  you  ever  think  what  a  symbol  of  the  soul  is  fur- 
nished by  the  sea  ?  In  its  capacity,  contents,  charac- 
teristics and  functions,  it  pictures  the  life  and 
powers  of  that  boundless,  fathomless  mystery  which 
we  call  the  human  soul.  You  have  stood  by  the  sea- 
shore and  gazed  on  the  ocean's  glory  and  gloom; 
have  listened  to  its  music  and  moan,  and  watched  its 
ever  varying  phases  in  storm  and  sunshine.  You 
have  crossed  the  Atlantic,  perhaps,  and  seen  its  rest 
and  raging,  its  beauty  and  its  horror;  fascinated 
alike  by  each ;  looking  sometimes  at  the  grandeur  of 
the  gale,  and  again  at  those  mysterious  fires  at  night, 
that  seem  to  burn  like  molten  silver  in  a  sea  of  ink. 
The  sea  has  wonders  but  little  known.  Science,  in- 
deed, has  entered  into  the  treasures  of  the  deep  and 
walked  its  paths  in  search  of  its  life  and  lav/,  but 


110  The  Mystery  and  Mastery  of  Men. 

how  meagre  the  results.  The  watery  realm  is  made 
the  highway  of  commerce,  and  its  vital  forces,  though 
unexplained,  are  utilized  in  the  material  interests  of 
society.  So  is  it  with  men.  We  know  them  as 
physical  substances,  we  use  and  abuse  them,  but  how 
superficial  is  our  interest,  beyond  what  we  can  get 
out  of  them. 

As  in  the  sea,  so  in  the  soul,  there  are  depths  which 
no  plummet-line  has  measured.  There  are  cargoes 
of  wealth,  slumbering  energies  and  magnificent 
possibilities  as  yet  undiscovered,  that  might  enrich 
the  explorer  who  knew  how  to  draw  them  out. 
There  are  buried  treasures  in  the  secret  and  sunless 
caverns  of  human  hearts,  blasted  hopes,  withered 
friendships,  shipwrecked  opportunities,  some  of 
which  might  be,  perhaps,  restored  to  the  soul. 

The  restless  and  resistless  energies  of  the  sea  are 
but  feeble  types  of  the  finer,  fiercer  forces  of  man 
that  ought  to  be  utilized  in  the  service  of  God  and  of 
humanity.  Science  claims  to  have  mastered  the 
deep,  to  have  tamed  its  tempests ;  to  have  found  out 
those  celestial  currents  that  pull  the  needle  to  the 
pole;  to  have  formulated  those  astronomic  and 
meteorological  facts  which  guide  us  over  ocean  high- 
ways as  safely  as  over  those  of  steel  and  stone,  so 
that  we  travel  the  Atlantic  with  the  regularity  and 
restful  certainty  of  a  railway  journey  ashore.  But 
who  has  formulated  the  facts  of  human  thought  and 
emotion,  "entered  into  the  springs "  of  this  sea,  and 


The  Human  Face.  Ill 

"measured  the  waters  thereof  in  the  hollow  of  His 
hand  ? "  Navigators  map  out  the  ocean,  but  where  is 
the  chart  of  a  human  soul  ?  There  are  more  circui- 
tous passages  and  perilous  currents,  rocks  and  shoals, 
simoons  and  cyclones  to  be  encountered  there,  than 
those  which  the  mariner  meets.  Nicer  calculations 
are  needed,  more  patient  watchfulness,  more  alert- 
ness and  skill  than  are  required  in  navigation.  The 
sailor  reads  the  sky,  studies  the  clouds  and  watches 
the  waves — their  color,  altitude,  velocity,  momentum 
and  pulsation.  But  there  is  no  object  in  the  universe 
so  wonderful  as  the  human  face,  a  crystal  glass,  as 
it  were,  through  which  we  see  the  soul  in  its  ever- 
changing  phases  of  feeling;  now  full  of  hope,  joy 
and  love,  now  dark  with  portentous  clouds  that  tell 
of  gathering  anxieties  and  sorrows,  or  sullen,  wrath- 
ful passion.  The  skill  which  the  sailor  has  in  the 
interpretation  of  certain  signs  and  phenomena  at  sea 
makes  him  a  marvel  to  the  uninitiated,  and  so  it  is 
with  the  physiogonomist  or  psychologist  who  has 
studied  the  greater  mystery,  man. 

It  is  easier  to  expatiate  on  the  Mystery  than  to 
show  the  method  of  Man's  Mastery ;  easier  to  show 
how  fearfully  and  wonderfully  he  is  made,  than  to 
tell  how  he  is  to  be  controlled. 

What  is  the  genesis  and  growth  of  that  subtle 
something  which  we  call  PERSONAL  MAGNETISM  ? 

This  is  a  common  phrase.  It  conveys  no  specific 
idea,  for  no  one  yet  has  analyzed  it,  fully ;  perhaps 


112          The  Mystery  and  Mastery  of  Men. 

ever  will  until  we  know  what  that  mysterious  in- 
fluence is  that  allures  the  needle  to  the  north  and 
holds  it  there.  When  that  is  done,  or  Electricity  is 
explained,  we  may  know  what  it  is  that  makes  one 
man  obey  another,  almost  in  spite  of  himself. 

Science  often  lends  to  art  and  ethics  convenient 
phrases.  A  term  applied  to  metals  often  fits  man. 
Relations  of  the  physical  universe  find  their  parallel 
in  the  moral  world.  Hence  we  borrow  phrases  from 
the  former,  to  explain  the  phenomena  of  the  latter. 
Prof.  Phelps  says  that  "  Thought  and  feeling,  spirit- 
ual power  and  animal  magnetism  are  a  conglomerate 
that  lie  molten  together."  A  magnetic  line  may  some- 
times be  laid  down  between  the  pulpit  and  the  pew 
in  the  first  five  minutes  of  the  delivery  of  a  sermon, 
which  shall  vibrate  with  electric  responses  all  the 
way  through.  The  "  mutual  magnetism  between 
speaker  and  hearer "  bears  a  perfect  orator  onward 
"without  the  aid  of  manuscript  or  memory." 

Now,  what  is  this  subtle  power  ?  Shall  we  call  it 
"  Sympathy  ?"  That  phrase  approaches  the  idea  but 
faintly.  It  does  not  carry  the  plenary  significance 
cf  the  element  we  wish  to  exhibit. 

Shall  we  use  a  phrase  taken  from  psychology  and 
say  "  psychical  contagion  ?"  We  now  get  nearer  to 
the  conception  of  that  condition  which  a  man  of 
powerful,  distributive  personality  is  able  to  induce  in 
the  average  audience.  Yet  this  word  compasses  the 
effects  rather  than  the  cause.  Shall  we  say  "  Atmos- 


Personal  Magnetism.  113 

phere?"  This  term,  used  by  Bushnell  and  other 
-writers,  expresses  another  form  of  the  idea.  It  is  an 
effort  of  language  to  describe  that  mysterious  efflux 
of  soul  which  men  feel,  but  which  is  hard  to  analyze. 
There  is  something  which  goes  out  of  and  envelops  a 
man  which  is  perceived  and  received  by  those  about 
him ;  which  infects  the  very  air  in  which  he  moves 
among  them  with  irresistible  power.  We  call  it  his 
"air."  It  is  felt  so  directly  and  palpably  that  it  is 
not  strange  that  some  writers  talk  about  "atomic 
affinities" — as  though  it  were  purely  a  physiological 
fact — and  "chemical  vapor,"  like  that  which  is  sup- 
posed to  be  exhaled  by  the  Upas  Tree,  or  the  pungent 
odor  said  to  be  ejected  by  the  rattlesnake,  traced  by 
negroes  two  hundred  feet  away. 

This  invisible  atmosphere,  or  radiation,  as  heat 
from  a  glowing  coal,  attracts  men  as  a  magnet  at- 
tracts fragments  of  steel.  Philip  Hamerton  says 
that  powerful  persons  emit  a  physical  influence 
which  prepares  those  they  touch  to  submit.  Much 
of  their  moral  influence  is  through  this  physical  con- 
tact which  excites  the  nervous  system  "with  an  odd, 
tingling  sensation."  He  felt  this  himself,  he  says,  as 
he  met  Napoleon  III.  A  friend,  also,  who  came  in 
contact  with  the  late  Emperor  "  felt  a  shock  of  im- 
measurable power."  He  adds,  "Who  could  have 
touched  Caesar  without  feeling  this  magnetic  emana- 
tion ?  Dr.  Livingstone  says  that  the  contact  of  the 
lion's  paw  conquers  the  will  of  the  victim,  and  makes 


114  The  Mystery  and  Mastery  of  Men. 

him  indifferent  to  its  bite.  So  a  great  human  power 
fascinates  the  imagination  and  subdues  the  will. 
Before  the  kings  of  men  open  their  lips,  the  listeners 
are  ready  to  obey." 

What  is  the  source  of  this  inexplicable  power  ?  It 
is  subtle,  pervasive,  elusive.  It  refuses  to  yield  to 
us  its  name,  its  atoms  or  its  laws.  Yet  we  may  push 
our  search  with  profit,  even  if  we  do  not  yet  learn  all 
that  we  would  wish  to  know.  We  may  hint  at  some 
sources  of  this  masterful  influence,  though  no 
single  one  of  these  'particulars  is  a  sufficient  ca,use 
in  itself. 

First.— It  is  manifest  that  Personal  Magnetism 
presupposes,  ordinarily,  resiliency  of  health.  This 
is  a  physical  basis.  It  may  not  always  exist,  but  ex- 
ceptions only  bring  the  general  principle  into  more 
prominent  view.  Feeble  people  are  not  apt  to  control 
their  fellows.  On  the  other  hand,  mere  strength  is 
insufficient.  An  ox  is  strong,  but  stolid  as  he  is 
strong.  Many  men  are  stalwart  and  vigorous  in 
muscle  and  mind,  but  utterly  destitute  of  personal 
magnetism. 

Still,  that  elastic  buoyancy  of  spirits  which  marks 
positive  health  is  itself  infective.  It  gives  a  ring  to 
the  voice,  a  sparkle  to  the  eye,  warmth  to  the  touch, 
and  firmness  to  the  step. 

Whether  or  not  life  is  worth  living  "  depends  upon 
the  liver,"  it  is  said.  If  that  organ  is  surcharged 
with  bile,  the  owner  will  surely  grow  saturnine.  Ho 


Health  and  Virility.  115 

will  be  likely  to  draw  away  from  men  and  cause 
them  to  withdraw  from  him.  Life  is  motheaten,  and 
society  has  no  charm  for  him.  But  a  sound  mind  in 
a  healthful  body  gives  push  and  pluck  and  power. 
As  Dr.  Mathew  says,  "the  first  requisite  to  success 
in  life  is  to  be  a  good  animal. "  In  any  of  the  learned 
professions  a  vigorous  constitution  is  equal  to  at  least 
fifty  per  cent,  more  brain.  He  admits  that  Pascal,  as 
well  as  Paul,  had  the  thorn  of  disease  in  his  body; 
that  Julius  Caesar  was  an  epileptic  and  Pope  an  in- 
valid cripple,  but  these  may  be  forgotten  in  the  bril- 
liant Broughams,  Palmerstons  and  Gladstones  who 
have  held  the  helm  of  state  with  steady  hand  till  late 
in  life.  It  used  to  be  said  in  England,  "The  King 
never  dies  and  Brougham  never  sleeps."  Yet  the 
latter  when  nearly  ninety,  was  tougher  than  many  a 
man  at  thirty. 

Secondly. — The  generative  functions  of  life  form 
an  element  of  masterful  energy.  Dr.  Henry  Mauds- 
ley,  in  "Body  and  Will,"  says  that  we  "eradicate 
the  vital  principle  of  morality,  of  poetic  and  artistic 
emotion,  of  religious  feeling  among  mankind,"  if  we 
"  eliminate  the  sexual  system  and  its  intimate  and 
essential  mental  workings  from  the  constitution  of 
human  nature.  In  the  conflict  of  the  passions  of  our 
nature  it  is  necessary  to  acknowledge  and  assimilate 
their  true  force  and  character,  and  so  to  get  the  best 
use  of  them,  not  by  vain  and  foolish  attempts  to  ex- 
tinguish them  as  mortal  enemies,  but  by  wise  and 


116  The  Mystery  and  Mastery  of  Men. 

patient  efforts  to  turn  and  guide  and  use  their  forces 
in  the  path  of  a  higher  development.  A  castrated 
chastity  is  a  chasity  without  contents.  The  holiness 
of  Heaven  postulates  the  root  passions  of  Hell." 
Eunuchs,  he  goes  on  to  say,  are  mutilated  in  mind 
and  body,  destitute  of  social  and  moral  feeling.  Lord 
Bacon  refers  to  the  same  point,  and  every  intelligent 
physician  knows  that  aphrodisiac  tendencies  play  an 
important  part  inhy  steria  and  other  nervous  ailments. 
The  erratic  and  the  erotic  are  not  far  removed  from 
each  other,  in  many  people.  The  more  manful  a 
man  is  himself,  the  more  puissant  he  is  in  swaying 
others.  Other  things  being  equal,  he  has  more  lever- 
age and  scope  of  action,  hence  there  is  a  quicker 
coalescence  of  his  will  with  their  will.  Kot  only  is 
buoyant,  bounding  health  a  segment  of  this  '*  mag- 
netic sphere,'1  but  a  "  virile  manhood"  is  another.  Its 
full  development  and  firm  control  f orm  a  vital  factor 
of  this  force. 

Thirdly. — Temperament  is  another  source.  It  has 
been  well  observed  that  this  to  man,  is  what  climate 
is  to  a  continent,  its  fate.  The  slant  of  the  sun  makes 
a  zone  torrid  or  arctic.  So  temperament  is  the  light 
in  which  men  look  at  things.  It  is  the  angle  of  vision. 
That  is  everything.  Men  have  irreconcilable  views 
because  their  outlooks  are  antipodal.  One  side  of  the 
shield  is  silver,  the  other,  gold.  If  both  sides  are  ex- 
amined there  will  be  no  battle  over  it.  Temperament 
may  be  disciplined,  but  how  few  attempt  to  improve 


Various   Temperaments.  117 

in  this  regard,  and  so  it  practically  is  one's  fate.  He 
who  is  sanguine  will  be  sanguine  still,  and  he  who  is 
phlegmatic  will  be  phlegmatic  still,  as  long  as  grass 
is  green  or  the  sea  is  salt.  There  are  temperaments 
that  burn  with  a  perfumed  flame.  They  carry  light, 
heat  and  fragrance  in  their  action,  while  there  are 
others  that  may  be  compared  to  a  blanket  wet  in  ice- 
water.  Men  shudder  and  flee  from  them.  "  Dinner- 
bell"  was  the  soubriquet  given  a  member  of  the  House 
of  Commons,  for  his  appearance  as  speech-maker 
was  a  signal  for  the  departure  of  many  who  could  not 
bear  his  dullness.  A  drowsy  man  is  not  magnetic, 
but  one  of  nervous  temperament — that  is,  full  of 
nerves,  quick  to  feel  and  electric  to  impart — he  is 
magnetic,  and  controls  the  sympathies  and  actions 
of  men  with  something  of  deific  power.  God  is  apt 
to  single  out  men  of  this  type  for  leaders.  He  has 
made  them  for  this  purpose  and  made  others,  with 
other  temperaments,  for  the  no  less  honorable  work 
appointed  them. 

Closely  allied  to  temperament,  is  another  factor. 

Fourthly. — Tact.  It  is  ten  times  more  valuable  in 
the  practical  control  of  men  than  mere  talent,  which 
is  an  intellectual  endowment,  according  to  Coleridge, 
"lying  in  the  understanding,  and  often  inherited." 
Tact  is  the  adroitness  of  touch,  the  handling  power, 
and  almost  a  perfect  synonyme  for  this  indefinite 
word  Magnetism.  It  involves  both  knowledge  and 
skill.  Largely  a  natural  aptitude,  it  is  also  a  culti- 


118  The  Mystery  and  Mastery  of  Men. 

vated  capacity.  Tact  is  eyesight  and  insight  and 
foresight.  As  we  made  Temperament  to  be  every, 
thing,  so  we  may  say,  Tact  is  everything,  in  the 
mastery  of  men. 

This  faculty  enables  one  to  put  himself  in  another 
man's  place,  to  see  as  he  sees  and  to  feel  as  he  feels. 
This  gives  the  experimenter  in  psychology,  the  stu- 
dent of  medicine,  the  practitioner  among  the  insane, 
a  marvelous  control.  Tact  is  an  invaluable  teacher 
of  rhetoric  and  oratory.  It  enriches  one's  vocabulary 
with  those  conciliatory,  persuasive  phrases  that  dis- 
arm opposition,  and  the  voice  with  those  tones  of  sin- 
cerity which  compel  belief,  in  spite  of  the  evidence 
of  the  senses  to  the  contrary.  Tact  inspires  candor, 
the  spirit  of  concession,  frankness  and  ingenuous- 
ness, to  which  the  bitterest  antagonist  bows  before  he 
knows  it.  The  pleader  need  not  lower  the  stringency 
of  truth,  but  he  conquers  by  new  modes  of  attack, 
Tact  is  often  wit.  Instead  of  dogmatic,  oracular  as- 
sertion,  the  man  of  tact  will  hide  his  argument  in  a 
pleasant  question,  and  spice  his  speech  with  sportive 
sallies  that  do  not  anger  an  opponent.  They  illumin- 
ate, but  they  do  not  burn.  Wit  was  auxilliary  to 
the  magnetic  tact  of  Erskine.  Defending  in  court  a 
man  named  Bolt,  he  repelled  the  insinuations  of  the 
prosecutor  by  affirming  that  his  client,  Bolt,  was  a 
man  of  such  sterling  integrity  that  he  everywhere 
went  by  the  name  of  "  Bolt-up-right," — a  fiction  that 
had  its  weight  with  the  jury.  The  keeper  of  a  men- 


Selfpossession.  119 

agerie  once  sought  redress  for  the  loss  of  his  trunk. 
Erskine  with,  ready  tact  and  wit  asked,  "Why  did  he 
not  imitate  his  own  sagacious  elephant,  and  carry  his 
trunk  before  his  eyes."  That  magnetic  man,  Lord 
Brougham,  was  able  by  his  pleasantry — never  forced 
or  overdone — "to  turn  away  wrath  and  to  refresh 
jaded  listeners ;  he  could  turn  into  a  laugh  the  in- 
vective that  had  been  destined  to  crush  himself.*' 
Disraeli's  wit  was  said  to  be,  not  the  handmaid, 
merely,  but  the  right  hand  of  his  power.  His  polished 
irony  was  the  steeled  hand  in  the  silken  glove.  "The 
adder  lurks  under  the  rose-leaves  of  his  rhetoric: 
the  golden  arrows  are  tipped  with  poison." 

We  must  arrest  this  part  of  the  discussion,  for  we 
have  to  consider  the  growth  of  this  multiform  power. 
The  culture  as  well  as  the  source  needs  attention. 
We  have  spoken  about  the  mystery,  and  a  few  ele- 
ments of  the  mastery,  of  man,  resiliency  of  health, 
vigorous  animal  instincts  and  a  temperament  fitted 
to  guide,  inspire  and  control.  Tact  was  a  fourth 
factor.  With  a  brief  reference  to  a  fifth,  we  must 
leave  this  part  of  the  subject. 

Fifthly, — A  self-possessed  soul,  alone,  can  expect 
to  possess  others.  A  great  deal  is  meant  by  this 
term  in  its  active  and  passive  use.  In  its  regulative 
action,  self-possession  gives  the  individual  a  serene 
and  lordly  supremacy  over  his  environments.  He 
sees  just  what  to  do  and  how  to  do  it,  without  haste 
or  embarrassment.  It  is  not  only  an  active,  direct- 


120  The  Mystery  and  Mastery  of  Men. 

ing  power,  but  it  also  enables  one  to  wait,  to  bear, 
to  veil  under  a  quietude  of  manner  a  vast  amount  of 
reserved  force. 

Gentleness  is  one  manifestation  of  this  masterful 
self-possession.  God's  gentleness  makes  man  great. 
Ib  is  not  in  the  storm,  the  whirlwind,  the  earthquake, 
that  men  are  soonest  moved,  but  by  the  still,  small 
voice.  There  is  a  place  for  Demosthenes  and  others 
whose  style  is  noisy,  violent  and  peremptory.  Some 
men  will  only  be  moved  by  a  coercive  and  defiant 
tone — austere,  vigorous  and  Draconian ;  but  they  are 
few  in  proportion.  A  calm,  unruffled,  self-possessed 
speaker  will  sometimes  carry  an  audience  or  a  jury 
simply  by  his  pacific  and  courteous  air,  in  which 
there  is  no  trace  of  embarrassment,  no  tinge  of 
cowardice  and  no  hint  of  fear.  His  strength  is 
shown  by  his  quietness  and  his  assurance  of  success 
in  his  unpretentious  methods.  He  represses  in 
others  the  tumult  which  he  has  before  smothered  in 
his  own  breast,  and  wields,  as  it  were,  a  mesmeric 
spell  over  their  feelings  and  their  acts. 

The  arguments  of  Phocion  have  been  compared  in 
power  to  the  falling  axe,  which  flies  swift,  sure  and 
with  relentless  energy.  It  was  imperious  and  mer- 
ciless, dreaded  like  the  yoke  under  which  Romans 
were  compelled  to  stoop,  when  conquered.  A  hope- 
less seige  was  often  continued,  simply  because  of  this 
dreaded  humiliation.  Whately  says  that  it  is  just  so 
with  some  unwise  logicians.  Their  links  of  logic  are 


Gentleness.  121 

strong  as  steel.  For  every  wherefore  there  is  a  there- 
fore, and  they  drive  one  to  despair.  They  stand  as  an 
unfeeling  parent,  rod  in  hand,  correcting  a  child. 
There  is  110  pity  in  the  eye,  and  no  gentleness  in  the 
voice.  The  culprit  finds  himself  defenceless  and 
weak ;  submits  outwardly,  but  nurses  rebellion  with- 
in. A  single  tear  would  have  melted  the  icy  obsti- 
nacy and  brought  the  humbled  creature  to  his  knees 
in  repentant  obedience.  Passion  begets  passion,  and 
composure  inspires  confidence.  Power  is  patient. 
"Weakness  frets  and  fumes.  Anger  is  diverted  and 
curiosity  is  awakened  by  the  quiet,  disguised  move- 
ment of  a  self-possessed  person.  Love  is  sooner 
elicited  from  shrinking  souls  by  those  gentle  indirec- 
tions which  such  a  one  "would  naturally  use  instead  of 
direct  appeal.  Hope,  expectancy,  belief,  all  the  vari- 
ous emotions  on  which  the  master  of  men  knows 
how  to  play,  are  quickened  by  the  same  unstudied, 
apparently  careless  ease  shown  by  one  thus  self- 
possessed.  As  the  contagion  of  fear  is  quickly 
spread,  so  the  feeling  of  eager,  wondering  confidence 
is  caught  up  by  hearers  and  lookers  on,  where  a 
masterful  soul  is  the  centre,  an  imperial  power,  self- 
contained,  active,  passive,  enclosed  or  disclosed  at 
will.  It  wields  a  control  over  others  as  complete  in 
degree,  as  it  is  unpretentious  in  display. 

As  to  the  culture  of  this  power,  it  hardly  needs  to 
be  said  that  its  use  will  enlarge  its  scope,  and  that  it 
duplicates  and  reduplicates  itself  by  exercise.  Sue- 


122  The  Mystery  and  Mastery  of  Men. 

cess  is  a  stimulus,  and  failure,  too,  is  our  best  teacher 
oftentimes. 

The  field  of  discipline  and  growth  is  large.  Men 
soon  find  their  places.  In  some  swarthy,  vascular, 
vigorous  natures  there  is  what  Emerson  calls  an  ex- 
cess of  virility.  "  They  illustrate  the  old  meaning  of 
courage:  a  plenitude  of  blood  collected  in  the  heart 
and  arterial  system.  Others  have  cold  hands,  re- 
main bystanders,  or  are  only  dragged  in  by  the 
humor  and  vivacity  of  those  who  can  carry  a  dead- 
weight. Sickness  is  poor-spirited  and  cannot  serve 
anyone.  It  must  husband  its  resources  to  live.  But 
health  or  fulness  answers  its  own  ends,  and  has  to 
spare ;  runs  over  and  inundates  the  neighborhoods 
and  creeks  of  other  men's  necessities." 

In  closing  a  theme  of  which  we  have  seen  only  the 
physical,  man  ward  side,  I  must  remind  you  of  the 
wide  territory  of  spiritual  truths  into  which  we  have 
not  entered,  belonging  to  the  preacher  rather  than  to 
the  physiologist,  to  the  religious,  rather  than  the 
scientific  side.  Happy  is  that  man  who  has  both* 
gifts  and  graces,  earthly  and  celestial  resources, 
who,  when  the  world  puts  to  him — as  it  does  to  all  of 
us — the  query  the  harlot  put  to  Samson,  "  Tell  me,  I 
pray  thee,  wherein  thy  great  strength  lieth,"  may  be 
able  to  say,  "In  Thee,  O  God,  are  all  my  springs. 
Partaker  of  the  Divine  Nature,  and  filled  with  the 
fulness  of  God,  I  CA$  po  ALL.  THINGS  J " 


THE  PERIL  OF  THE  CITY. 


Read    January   29th.  1889,  before  the  Manhattan  Association, 
at  Brooklyn,  New  York 


The  enormous  disproportion  in  the  growth  of  civic 
life,  compared  with  rural,  is  a  startling  diagnostic 
feature  of  American  society.  Our  cities,  like  sponges, 
suck  up  about  one-quarter  of  our  population  to-day,  as 
against  a  thirtieth  at  the  beginning.  Their  growth 
is  yearly  accelerated. 

The  change  of  men's  vocation,  as  well  as  their 
location,  is  a  second  factor  in  the  peril  we  are  meas- 
uring. "Whereas  85  per  cent,  of  our  people  were 
formerly  engaged  in  outdoor  pursuits,  mainly  agri- 
culture or  fisheries,  now  not  half  that  number  are 
thus  employed.  Mechanical  pursuits  swallow  up  the 
energies  of  our  citizens.  Every  medical  man  sees 
the  peril  to  general  health  in  this  massing  of  men, 
women,  children — millions  of  them — indoors,  often 
amid  defective  sanitary  conditions  and  under  a  pres- 
sure of  toil,  clamorous  and  depressing. 

There  is  also  peril  in  the  narrowing  of  individual 
activity  to  petty  and  monotonous  details,  such  as 


124  The  Peril  of  the  City. 

are  incident  to  modern  manufacturing  activity,  as 
•where  sixty  men  make  sixty  parts  of  a  shoe,  and 
eighty  are  busied  in  making  a  postage  stamp.      This 
specialization  of  nerve  function  is  a  sterilizing  pro- 
cess to  brain  and  soul.     "Workmen  feel  themselves 
dwindling  under  rotary,   repetitious  toil.      Neuras- 
thenia, intemperance  and  various  sexual  and  social 
disorders  stand  related  to  this  indoor,  monotonous, 
joyless,  unnatural  life.     Then,  again,  there  are  domi- 
ciliary features  of  city  life   also  suggestive.     The 
ethics  of  architecture  are  too  often  ignored  by  cap- 
italists, for  the  statistics  of  certain  tenement  wards 
in  New  York  City  show  localities  as  densely  crowd- 
ed as  in  China.     "If  you  lived  where  I  do,  you,  too, 
would  drink,"  said  a  Glasgow  workman  to  Chadwick, 
the  English  philanthropist,   a   remark  that  was  an 
eye-opener  to  that  afterward  most  patient  and  ob- 
servant statistician. 

But  psychic  contagion  in  our  crowded  cities  is  an 
element  as  definite  and  potential  as  sewer  gas  or 
typhus  germs.  Mental  and  moral  aberrations  come 
of  contiguity  and  association  as  surely  as  fever  and 
cholera.  Health,  purity,  honesty  and  virtue  are  well 
nigh  impossible  under  such  polluting  domestic  con- 
ditions as  Dr.  A.  T.  Pierson  has  described,  where,  in 
one  case,  he  found  eighteen  persons,  male  and 
female,  black  and  white,  old  and  young,  lodging  in  a 
single  room,  10  by  12  feet.  The  large  percentage  of 
citizens  of  foreign  parentage — 70  per  cent,  of  the 


Help  from  the  Sanctuary.  125 

population  of  this  City  of  Churches,  for  example — the 
peril  of  the  saloon  and  other  evils  complicate  the 
problem. 

But  the  diagnosis  of  a  case  is  but  preparatory  to  its 
treatment.  How  shall  the  church  meet  the  perils 
that  environ  and  jeopordize  the  souls  it  would  save  ? 
How  shall  it  link  its  life  to  the  daily  life  of  the  peo- 
ple ?  How  shall  it  send  "  help  from  the  sanctuary  " 
to  the  toiling,  tempted  thousands  that  need  its  help- 
ful ministry  ?  Plainly  enough,  the  pulpit  of  Sunday 
and  the  one  evening  meeting  during  the  week  will 
not  compass  the  end  we  seek.  May  we  not  learn 
something  in  method  and  spirit  from  our  brethren  in 
England  ?  Seven  summers  there  have  taught  me 
much.  It  has  been  my  privilege  to  serve  in  five 
churches,  Presbyterian  and  Congregational,  one  of 
them  for  months,  in  the  aggregate.  The  latter  has 
about  500  membership,  conveniently  classified  under 
the  appropriate  supervision  of  seven  deacons  accord- 
ing to  territorial  location.  This  busy  hive  of  workers 
is  found  in  the  midst  of  the  surging  millions  of  Lon- 
don, and  is  mainly  made  up  of  migratory  bread  win- 
ners. They  appreciate  the  peril  to  which  they  and 
their  neighbors  are  daily  exposed,  and  lay  their  plans 
of  church  work  with  reference  to  this  incessant  pres- 
sure of  danger,  day  and  night,  summer  and  winter, 
without  an  hour's  let  up.  From  the  early  gathering 
for  prayer  Sunday  morning,  to  that  of  Saturday  night 
at  the  close  of  the  week,  the  house  of  God,  through 


12G  The  Peril  of  the  City. 

the  year,  is  almost  all  the  time  open  in  some  part 
of  its  manifold  appointments,  Church,  Institute, 
Schools,  Restaurant,  the  Penny  Bank,  the  Mothers 
Room,  Band  of  Hope,  meetings  of  Deaf  and  Dumb, 
warehouse  clerks  and  other  guilds  and  classes  of 
workingmen  and  women,  young  and  old.  The  6,000 
annual  deposits  made  in  the  bank  managed  by 
this  church,  represent  not  only  thrift  and  economy 
on  the  part  of  900  depositors,  but  painstaking  fore- 
sight on  the  part  of  the  church.  When  I  have  met 
fifty  mothers,  gathered  from  humble  homes  in  the 
Monday  meeting,  and  talked  to  them  on  household 
economies,  hygiene,  motherhood,  parentage  and 
other  themes  of  practical  concern,  I  have  felt  the 
leverage  which  a  well  organized  church  may  hold 
in  the  exigent  affairs  of  a  life  full  of  peril  and  of 
promise. 

As  I  have  participated  in  the  outdoor  meetings 
held  in  the  neighboring  market-place  and  also  held 
just  outside  the  threshold  of  the  sanctuary,  or  have 
entered  the  dining-room  and  reading-room  where 
swarthy  workmen  meet  each  other,  and  meet  mem- 
bers of  the  church  which  controls  it ;  as  I  have  seen 
the  program  of  concerts,  debates,  lectures,  and  of 
the  industrial  exhibits  in.  which  the  church  has  in- 
terested itself — contributions  of  its  members,  not 
omitting  the  embodiments  of  the  pastor's  skill  in 
plastic  art — I  see  how  possible  it  is  for  a  consecrated 
church  to  enter  into,  and  possess  the  personal  life,  the 


New  Lines  of  Action.  127 

family  and  business  life  of  the  community  in  which 
its  life  is  planted.  The  Infants'  Friend  and  Dorcas 
Society,  with  active  officers,  the  Sick  Visiting  So- 
ciety, also  organized,  and  the  Christian  Band,  which 
works  in  great  London  thoroughfares  and  brings 
strangers  to  the  sanctuary,  are  other  agencies  of  this 
hundred-handed  Briareus  of  the  Gospel. 

The  point  to  which  these  suggestions  and  observa- 
tions lead  us  is  this :  The  more  intricate  and  delicate 
the  complexity  of  our  modern  civilization,  the  more 
elaborate,  minute  and  sagacious  must  be  those  meth- 
ods by  which  we  reach  our  sympathetic  endeavors  to 
the  millions  that  are  struggling  in  the  seething,  surg- 
ing maelstroms  of  city  life. 

Antique  methods  of  warfare  do  not  serve  the  de- 
mands of  naval  and  military  science  to-day,  nor  will 
it  do  for  the  church  to  overlook  the  new  conditions 
of  our  social  life,  and  the  newer  lines  on  which  we 
are  to  push  aggressive  action.  Dangers  indeed, 
hover  like  an  electric  cloud  over  our  clustered  cities, 
but  many  of  these  perils  in  themselves  are  compen- 
sative, directly  and  grandly  so.  Heaven,  the  sublime 
culmination  of  human  society,  is  pictured,  not  as  a 
rural  retreat,  but  as  a  city,  populous,  radiant,  busy, 
opulent,  pure,  secure.  Let  it  be  our  aim  to  eliminate 
from  our  terrestrial  civic  life  the  elements  that  im- 
poverish and  imperil,  and  incorporate  those  which 
will  make  it  a  more  worthy  symbol  of  that  which  is 
to  be  satisfying  and  eternal, 


128  The  Peril  of  the  City. 

NOTE.— It  is  not  a  mere  incident  or  accident,  that  the  close  of  the 
American  Revolution  should  so  nearly  synchronize  with  the  beginning 
of  the  French  Revolution,  for  it  would  be  easy  to  signalize  factors 
common  to  both.  We  do  well  to  recall  the  utterance  of  the  First  Na- 
tional Assembly  of  France,  ' '  Ignorance,  neglect  or  contempt  of  human 
rights  are  the  sole  causes  of  public  misfortunes  and  corruptions  of 
government;'' also  the  words  of  Mazzini,  addressing  the  Italians,  who 
wisely  said,  "Wo  seek  the  kingdom  of  God  on  earth,  and  that  society 
may  be  an  endeavor  after  the  progressive  realization  of  the  divine  idea. 
Be  such  as  Christ  and  His  apostles,  and  you  will  conquer.  Preach 
virtue,  sacrifice  and  love.  Be  yourselves  virtuous,  loving,  ready  for 
self  sacrifice. ' ' 

The  rule  of  the  Master  is  the  truest  guide  in  social  reform.  The 
ominous  signs  in  our  municipal  and  national  life  urge  a  more  thorough 
identification  of  the  Christian  church  with  the  interests  of  the  toiling 
poor,  as  an  enlightening,  inspiring  and  guiding  power.  These  tren- 
chant words  of  a  pastor  to  a  wealthy  congregation  in  New  York  city, 
ought  to  be  no  longer  true,  ' '  While  wealth  betakes  itself  to  its  elegant 
seclusion,  and  poverty  gathers  itself  in  appalling  masses  in  its  neglected 
and  infamous  haunts  ;  while  dishonesty  is  undermining  the  confidence 
of  the  community,  and  crime  fills  our  households  with  horror,  a  dainty 
Christianity  is  looking  on  from  a  distance,  afraid  of  soiling  its  hands 
in  the  work  of  social  regeneration. " 


AMERICAN  LIFE 

AS    RELATED    TO    INEBRIETY 


Read  in  London,  Oct.  4, 1887  before  the  Society  for  the  Study  of  Inebriety. 


At  the  International  Congress,  held  in  London, 
under  the  auspices  of  the  Society  for  the  Study  of 
Inebriety,  brief  reference  was  made  to  certain  factors 
which  contribute  to  make  the  study  of  Inebriety  in 
America  specially  serious  and  urgent.  I  have  been 
desired  to  recall,  record  and  expand  those  unwritten 
utterances.  Novelty  and  originality  they  may  not 
possess,  yet  old  truths  in  a  new  light  may  be  helpful 
to  us  in  the  interpretation  of  the  pathological  and 
psychological  phenomena  of  this  disease. 

Although  there  are  abiding  factors  the  world  over, 
in  America  we  have  elements  to  study  which  are 
peculiar  and  unique.  By  America  is  meant  the  Amer- 
ican Republic,  the  states  and  territories  bounded  by 
the  seas,  the  lakes  and  the  gulf.  It  will  be  my  aim 
to  show  that  the  sixty  millions  of  this  vast  country 
are  placed  under  those  physical,  psychic,  political  and 
social  conditions  which  combine  to  make  life  more 


130  American  Life. 

vividly  intense  and  exacting  than  anywhere  else  on 
this  planet,  and  therefore  are  more  susceptible  to  the 
malady  of  Inebriety. 

This  region  has  been  called  "The  Intemperate 
Belt,'7  because,  as  my  lamented  friend,  the  late  Dr. 
George  M.  Beard  of  New  York,  has  said,  "  Inebriety, 
as  distinguished  from  the  vice  or  habit  of  drunken- 
ness, may  be  said  to  have  been  born  in  America;  has 
developed  sooner  and  far  more  rapidly  than  else- 
where; like  other  nerve  maladies  is  especially  fre- 
quent here.  It  is  for  this  reason,  mainly,  that  asylums 
for  inebriates  were  first  organized  here."  Here  also 
the  total  abstinence  societies  of  modern  days  began. 
Why  ?  Because  the  abnormal  nerve  sensibility  which 
the  feverish  rush  of  life  here  has  developed,  indi- 
cate a  physiological  condition  that  will  not  tolerate 
stimulants. 

Dr.  Beard  says  that  it  is  a  greater  sight  than 
Niagara,  presented  to  a  European  coming  to  this 
land,  to  behold  an  immense  body  of  intelligent 
citizens,  voluntarily  and  habitually  abstaining  from 
alcoholic  beverages.  "There  is  perhaps  no  single 
fact  in  sociology  more  instructive  and  far  reaching 
than  this;  and  this  is  but  a  fraction  of  the  general 
and  sweeping  fact  that  the  heightened  sensitiveness 
of  Americans  forces  them  to  abstain  entirely,  or  to 
use  in  incredible  and  amusing  moderation,  not  only 
the  stronger  alcoholic  liquors,  but  the  milder  wines, 
ales  and  beers,  and  even  tea  and  coffee.  Half  my 


Heightened  Sensitiveness.  131 

nervous  patients  give  up  coffee  before  I  see  them, 
and  very  many  abandon  tea.  Less  than  a  century 
ago,  a  man  who  could  not  carry  many  bottles  of  wine 
was  thought  effeminate.  Fifty  years  ago  opium  pro- 
duced sleep,  now  the  same  dose  keeps  us  awake,  like 
coffee  and  tea.  Susceptibility  to  this  drug  is  revolu- 
tionized." 

Dr.  Beard  makes  the  ability  to  bear  stimulants  a 
measure  of  nerves,  and  asserts  that  the  English  are 
of  "more  bottle  power  than  the  Americans  ;"  that  it 
is  worth  an  ocean  voyage  to  see  how  they  can  drink. 
A  steamer  seat-mate  poured  down  almost  at  a  swal- 
low a  half  tumberful  of  whiskey  with  some  water 
added.  He  was  a  prominent  minister  in  the  Estab- 
lished Church,  advanced  in  years,  yet  robust.  He 
replied  to  the  query,  "How  can  you  stand  that?" 
that  he  had  been  a  drinker  all  his  life  and  felt  no 
harm. 

The  same  relative  sensitiveness  is  shown  in  regard 
to  opium,  tobacco,  and  other  narcotic  poisons.  The 
stolid  Turk  begins  to  smoke  in  early  childhood,  when 
seven  or  eight ;  everybody  smokes,  men,  women  and 
little  ones,  yet  the  chief  oculist  in  Constantinople 
says  that  cases  of  amaurosis  are  very  few.  A  surgeon 
whom  I  have  known,  Dr.  Sewny  of  Aintab,  after 
years  of  extensive  practice  in  Asia  Minor,  has  yet  to 
see  the  first  case  of  amaurosis  or  amblyopia  due  solely 
to  tobacco.  But  Americans  cannot  imitate  Turk, 
Hollander  and  Chinese.  Heart  and  brain,  eyes,  teeth, 


132  American  Life. 

muscle  and  nerve  are  ruined  by  these  vices,  yet  the 
frightful  fact  remains  that  latterly  the  importation  of 
opium  has  increased  500  per  cent.!  The  "tobacco 
heart "  and  other  fatal  effects  of  cigarette  smoking 
are  attracting  the  attention  of  legislators  as  well  as 
physicians,  and  the  giving  or  selling  this  diminutive 
demon  to  youth  is  made  in  some  places  a  punishable 
offence. 

Physical,  psychic,  political  and  social  conditions 
combine  in'the  evolution  of  this  phenomenal  suscep- 
tibility. Nowhere,  for  instance,  are  such  extremes  in 
thermal  changes.  I  have  seen  in  New  England  a 
range  of  125°,  from  25°  below  to  100°  above,  in  the 
shade.  The  year's  record  at  Minnesota  reads  from 
39°  below  to  99°  above,  a  range  of  338°.  Even  within 
twenty-four  hours,  and  in  balmy  regions  like  Florida, 
the  glass  has  shown  a  leap  from  torrid  heat  to  frosty 
chill. 

No  wonder,  then,  that  the  greatest  fear  of  some  is 
the  atmosphere!  They  dread  to  go  out  to  face  Arctic 
rigor  or  tropic  fire,  and  so  get  in  the  way  of  staying 
indoors,  even  in  exquisite  weather  of  June  and  Octo- 
ber. They  make  rooms  small,  put  on  double  windows, 
with  list  on  the  doors,  and  build  a  roaring  furnace 
fire  in  the  cellar,  adding  another  of  bright  anthracite 
in  the  grate.  The  difference  between  this  hot,  dry, 
baked  air  within  and  the  wintry  air  without  is  some- 
times 80°.  It  is  estimated  that  the  difference  of  tem- 
perature inside  and  outside  an  English  home  averages 


Climatic  Influences.  133 

20°,  and  that  within  and  without  an  American  dwel- 
ling is  60°.  The  relation  of  this  to  the  nervousness  of 
the  people  is  apparent. 

The  uniform  brightness  of  American  skies  favors 
evaporation.  The  Yankee  is  not  plump  and  ruddy 
like  his  moist,  solid  British  brother,  but  lean,  angular, 
wiry,  with  a  dry,  electrical  skin.  He  lights  the  gas 
with  his  fingers  and  foretells  with  certainty  the  com- 
ing storm  by  his  neuralgic  bones.  Hourly  observa- 
tions were  conducted  for  five  years  with  Capt.  Catlin , 
U.S.A.,  a  sufferer  from  traumatic  neuralgia  in  care 
of  Dr.  Mitchell.  The  relation  of  the  prognostic  pains 
to  barometric  depression  and  the  earth's  magnet- 
ism was  certified  beyond  doubt,  and  was  reported 
to  the  National  Academy  of  Science,  April,  1879. 
Even  animals,  in  the  Sacramento  valley  and  on  the 
Pacific  coast,  are  unwontedly  irritable  while  the 
north  desert  winds  are  blowing,  and  electricity, 
seeking  equilibrium,  is  going  to  and  from  the  earth. 
Fruits,  foliage  and  grass,  towards  the  wind,  shrivel. 
Jets  of  lightning  appear  on  the  rocks  and  some- 
times on  one's  walking  stick.  ("American  Nervous- 
ness,'  p.  147.) 

But  psychic  and  social  factors  cannot  be  ignored. 
Someone  has  said  that  insanity  is  the  price  we  pay 
for  civilization.  Barbarians  are  not  nervous.  They 
may  say  with  the  Duchess  of  Marlborough  that  they 
were  born  before  nerves  were  invented.  They  take 
no  thought  of  the  morrow.  Market  returns  and  stock 


134  American  Life. 

quotations  are  unknown ;  telephones  and  telegraphs ; 
daily  newspapers,  with  all  their  crowded  columns  of 
horror  and  crimes,  are  not  thrust  upon  them ;  and  the 
shriek  of  the  steam  engine  does  not  disturb  their  mid- 
day or  their  midnight  sleep.  Once  a  day  they  may 
look  at  the  sun,  but  they  never  carry  watches.  This 
bad  habit  of  carrying  watches  is  rebuked  by  a  distin- 
guished alienist,  who  says  that  a  look  at  one's  watch 
when  an  appointment  is  near,  sensibly  accelerates 
the  heart's  action  and  is  correlated  to  a  definite 
loss  of  nervous  energy.  Every  advance  of  refinement 
brings  conflict  and  conquest  that  are  to  be  paid  for  in 
blood  and  nerve  and  life.  Now  it  is  true  that  watches 
are  occasionally  seen  in  England.  Sun-dials  are  not 
in  constant  use  in  Germany  and  Switzerland.  But 
the  "American  Watch"  is  an  institution.  Not  the 
Elgin,  the  Waterbury  or  any  particular  watch,  but 
the  worry  and  haste  and  incessant  strain  to  accom- 
plish much  in  a  little  time— all  this,  symbolized  in  the 
pocket  time-piece,  is  peculiarly  American.  It  was  an 
American,  who,  at  Buffalo,  I  think,  wanted  to  wire 
on  to  Washington.  When  told  it  would  take  ten  min- 
utes, he  turned  away  and  said  "I  can't  wait."  He 
now  uses  the  Edison  telephone  and  talks  mouth  to 
mouth  with  his  friend.  Dr.  Talmage  says  "  We  are 
born  in  a  hurry,  live  in  a  hurry,  die  in  a  hurry  and 
are  driven  to  Greenwood  on  a  trot  ?"  The  little  child, 
instead  of  quietly  saying  to  its  playmate,  "Come," 
nervously  shouts,  "  Hurry  up  ! "  You  cannot  approach 


Bayard  Taylor.  135 

the  door  of  a  street  car,  or  railway  carriage,  but  what 
you  hear  the  same  fidgetty  cry,  "Step  lively !"  Said 
a  New  Yorker  to  me,  "I  am  growing  old  five  years 
every  year."  Can  such  physical  bankrupts,  whose 
brains  are  on  the  brink  of  collapse,  bear  the  added 
excitement  of  drink  ?  The  gifted  Bayard  Taylor  was 
but  one  of  thousands  who  burned  a  noble  brain  to 
ashes  in  a  too  eager  race  of  life.  Reviewing  sixteen 
months,  he  notes  the  erection  of  a  dwelling  house, 
with  all  its  multitudinous  cares,  the  issuing  of  two 
volumes  of  his  writings,  the  preparation  of  forty-eight 
articles  for  periodicals,  the  delivery  of  250  lectures, 
one  every  other  day,  and  30,000  miles  of  travel.  The 
same  story  might  be  told  of  other  brain-workers  who 
never  accepted  the  "gospel  of  rest." 

The  emulous  rivalries  of  business  life  and  the 
speculative  character  of  its  ventures  cannot  be 
paralleled  elsewhere.  The  incessant  strain  they  im- 
pose increases  mental  instability.  Bulls  and  bears, 
pools,  corners,  margins,  syndicates  and  other  "  ways 
that  are  dark,  and  tricks  that  are  vain,"  represent  the 
omninous  passion  for  gambling.  Millions  may  be 
made  or  lost  in  a  day.  No  one  is  surprised  if  a  Wall 
Street  panic  is  followed  by  suicides.  Legitimate  busi- 
ness may,  by  its  methods,  exert  a  pernicious  influence 
on  the  nervous  system  in  still  other  ways,  as  for  ex- 
ample, in  the  depressing  influence  from  specialization 
of  nerve  function,  as  indicated  by  Dr.  J.  S.  Jewell, 
where  one  keeps  doing  one  petty  thing  monotonously 


136  American  Life. 

year  after  year,  and  so  sterilizes  mind  and  muscle 
in  every  other  direction. 

Turning  to  Educational  systems  in  America,  we 
see  how  unphysiological  they  are,  and  calculated  to 
exhaust  the  nervous  energy  of  youth,  many  of  whom 
have  inherited  a  morbid,  neurotic  diathesis.  Of  twenty- 
seven  cases  of  chorea  reported  by  Dr.  Win.  A.  Ham- 
mond of  Bellevue  Hospital,  eight— about  one-third— 
were  "induced  by  intense  study  at  school."  Dr. 
Treichler's  investigations  as  to  "Habitual  Headache 
in  Children,"  cover  a  wide  field,  and  show  that  con- 
tinental communities  suffer  from  similar  neglect  of 
natural  laws.  Here  it  is  more  notorious. 

Not  to  dwell  on  these  points,  we  may  say  that  the 
stimulus  of  liberty  is  a  productive  cause  of  neuras- 
thenia in  America.  It  is  stated  that  insanity  has  in- 
creased in  Italy  since  there  has  been  civil  and  religious 
liberty  guaranteed.  Apost  hoc  is  not  always  apropter 
hoc.  But  it  is  obvious  that  the  sense  of  responsibility 
which  citizenship  brings ;  the  ambitions  awakened  by 
the  prospect  of  office,  position,  power  and  influence ; 
the  friction  and  disquiet,  bickerings  and  wranglings, 
disappointment  and  chagrin  that  attend  the  struggles 
and  agitations  of  political  life,  do  exhaust  men,  and 
more  in  a  land  where  opportunities  for  advancement 
are  abundant,  as  in  America.  While  writing  these 
words,  news  are  received  of  the  sudden  death  of  a 
prominent  New  York  politician,  comparatively  young, 
directly  traceable  to  disappointment  in  carrying  out 


Political  Influences.  137 

a  scheme  on  which  his  heart  was  set.  Chagrin  acted 
like  a  virulent  poison  on  a  system  already  unstrung 
by  the  severe  political  struggle  in  which  he  was  de- 
feated. Multitudes  contract  the  vice  of  drunkenness, 
or  develop  the  full  malady  of  Inebriety,  under  the  con- 
tinued pressure  of  these  political  campaigns.  The 
patient  of  a  friend  of  mine  had,  for  two  years,  been 
kept  in  working  order.  He  was  living,  however,  on  a 
small  reserve  of  nerve  force.  A  few  days  before  elec- 
tion he  was  drawn  into  a  five  minutes'  eager  discus- 
sion and  became  entirely  prostrated,  more  exhausted 
than  by  months  of  steady  work. 

Others  nations  have  their  measure  of  liberty  and 
aspirations  for  social  and  political  eminence  to  gratify. 
But  nowhere  have  men  the  exhilerating  possibilities 
of  position,  wealth  and  influence,  that  this  republican 
community  offers.  The  history  of  the  last  half  cen- 
tury, as  related  to  this  fact,  reads  like  a  romance. 
But  liberty,  like  beauty,  is  a  perilous  possession,  and 
it  has  been  truly  said  ' '  the  experiment  attempted  on 
this  continent  of  making  every  man,  every  child, 
every  woman  an  expert  in  politics  and  theology,  is 
one  of  the  costliest  of  experiments  with  living  human 
beings,  and  has  been  drawing  on  our  surplus  energies 
for  one  hundred  years." 

Finally,  American  life  is  cosmopolitan.  A  curious 
observer  noted  nine  nationalities  in  a  single  street 
car  in  New  York,  one  day.  I  repeated  the  fact  to  a 
few  of  my  students  who  were  riding  with  me  through 


138  American  Life. 

those  same  streets.  Looking  over  the  ten  or  dozen 
passengers  on  board,  one  of  them  at  once  replied, 
"Well,  there  are  five  nationalities  represented  here." 

In  one  aspect,  these  importations,  particularly  En- 
glish, German  and  Scandinavian,  are  compensative 
and  antidotal.  We  may  hope,  with  the  author  before 
quoted,  that  "the  typical  American  of  the  highest 
type  will,  in  the  near  future,  be  a  union  of  the  coarse 
and  fine  organizations ;  the  solidity  of  the  German, 
the  fire  of  the  Saxon,  the  delicacy  of  the  American, 
flowing  together  as  one ;  sensitive,  impressible,  read- 
ily affected  through  all  the  avenues  of  influence,  but 
trained  and  held  by  a  will  of  steel ;  original,  idiosyn- 
cratic ;  with  more  wiriness  than  excess  of  strength, 
and  achieving  his  purpose  not  so  much  through  the 
amount  of  his  force  as  in  the  wisdom  and  economy 
of  its  use." 

This  hope  may  be  realized  in  the  future,  and  in  the 
highest  type  of  American  manhood.  It  is  a  bright, 
optimistic  view  of  things,  but  we  have  to  do  with  the 
present,  and  the  evils  of  society  as  they  now  exist. 
We  have  to  face  the  fact  that  our  civic  life  is  growing 
at  the  expense  of  the  rural ;  that  our  cities  are  mass- 
ing people  by  hundreds  of  thousands,  among  whom, 
on  the  grounds  of  contiguity,  association  and  psychic 
sympathy,  evil  influences  become  more  potent  to  un- 
dermine the  welfare  of  society ;  that  we  have  to  en- 
counter in  America  the  drink  traffic  in  its  belligerent 
aspects,  as  nowhere  else,  not  only  politically  and 


Immigration.  139 

financially  organized  most  thoroughly,  but  ready  to 
use  fraud,  violence  or  assassination  if  other  means 
fail,  and  that  we  have  anarchism  stirring  up  discon- 
tent and  firing  the  passions  of  the  desperate  classes, 
who  understand  liberty  to  mean  license,  equality  to 
be  the  abolition  of  all  the  diversities  of  position  and 
property  which  intelligence,  temperance  and  industry 
have  made  and  will  make  to  the  end  of  time. 

We  have  had  a  practically  unrestricted  importation 
of  the  refuse  population  of  Europe.  Of  every  250 
immigrants  one  is  insane,  while  but  one  of  662  natives 
is  insane.  Add  to  these  facts  the  conditions  of  Amer- 
ican life  already  enumerated  as  related  to  the  develop- 
ment of  neuroses,  particularly  Inebriety,  and  we  have 
material  which  makes  the  study,  as  was  stated  at  the 
start,  serious  and  urgent.  Some  of  us  are  studying 
the  matter  historically  and  philosophically ;  some,  in 
the  asylum,  clinically  ;  some  of  us,  in  the  dissecting 
room  and  laboratory  with  scapel,  microscope  and  re- 
agent. Writers  like  Dr.  T.  L.  Wright  and  Dr.  T.  D. 
Crothers  are  illuminating  the  subject  in  its  pathologi- 
cal and  psychic  relations.  We  have  more  to  learn 
about  Heredity  and  Environment ;  more  about  the 
Physical  Basis  of  the  Will,  and  its  disintegration 
through  disease  and  wrong  doing;  more  about  In- 
heritance of  ideas,  Mental  Therapeutics  and  kindred 
themes.  To  the  discussion  of  topics  like  these,  the 
New  York  Academy  of  Anthropology  has  devoted 
attention,  and  I  close  this  paper  by  inviting  the  in- 


140  American  Life. 

dividual  co-operation  of  my  English  friends  in  a  work 
alluring  in  its  features,  humane  and  beneficent  in  its 
fruits. 

NOTE.— The  President  [NORMAN  KERB,  M.  D.,  F.  S.  L.]  gave  cases 
observed  by  him  twenty  years  ago  in  America,  illustrative  and  confirm- 
atory of  the  truth  of  DR.  THWING'S  propositions,  and  enlarged  on  the 
physiological,  psychological  and  climatological  factors  in  the  deter- 
mination  of  the  higher  intensity  of  Inebriety.  [Transactions,  Novem- 
ber, 1887.] 

The  London  representative  of  the  New  York  Herald  sent  an  account 
of  this  paper  by  cable,  and  spoke  of  the  interest  it  had  awakened.  The 
Quarterly  published  by  the  American  Society  for  the  Study  of  Inebriety, 
of  which  Dr.  T.  B.  Crothers,  Hartford,  Conn.,  is  editor,  republished 
it,  and  also  the  Medico-Legal  Society,  New  York,  before  which  it  was 
read.  Professor  Paul  Kowalewsky,  M.D.,  of  the  University  of  Khar- 
koff,  Russia,  quotes  from  it  in  his  new  volume,  "IVROGNERIE,  ses 
Causes  et  son  Traitement,"  Page  58. 


VOCAL  AND  MUSICAL  CULTURE 
AMERICA 


Read  May  8, 1888,  before  the  Society  of  Science,  Letters  and  Art,  Addison 
Hall,  Kensington,  London. 


The  conditions  and  possibilities  of  Art  in  America 
suggest  a  fruitful  and  attractive  theme.  For  many 
years  the  writer  has  been  busy  in  the  line  of  Vocal 
and  Rhetorical  culture  in  institutions  widely  scat- 
tered. He  as  had  opportunity  to  note  the  modifying 
influences  exerted  on  speech  and  song.  It  will  be 
the  aim  of  this  brief  paper  to  name  them  in  order, 
and  then  to  offer  a  few  suggestions  as  to  the  possible 
development  of  this  department  of  Art  in  America. 
The  influences  that  retard  or  accelerate  may  be  char- 
acterized as  physical  and  climatic,  social,  political 
and  moral  These  express  themselves  in  American 
life  with  increasing  distinctness  every  year.  They 
stamp  themselves  on  character  and  thought  with  con- 
spicuous clearness. 

1.  Notice  the  Intensity  of  American  Life.  This 
results  in  part  from  electric  and  climatic  conditions 


142  Vocal  and  Musical  Culture. 

which  cannot  now  be  analyzed.  Climate  to  a  country 
is  well  compared  to  temperament  in  the  individual—- 
his fate.  The  slant  of  the  sun  dooms  one  zone  to 
Arctic  frost  and  another  to  torrid  heat,  and  so  the 
angle  of  our  mental  life,  the  way  we  look  at  things, 
imposes  on  us  our  destiny.  The  heart  beats  faster  in 
New  York  than  in  London,  and  faster  still  in  West- 
ern altitudes.  There  are  other  influences  besides 
thermal  changes  and  electric  conditions  of  the  atmos- 
phere which  contribute  to  restlessness  and  impatience 
of  Americans.  This  velocity  and  momentum  of  life 
are  prophetic  of  evil  as  well  as  factors  of  success. 
Speed  is  a  good  thing,  but  safety  is  better.  Push  and 
zeal  are  valuable,  but  thoroughness  is  more  import- 
ant. The  application  of  this  one  feature  of  life  to 
business  and  to  education  might  occupy  our  thought 
at  great  length.  No  one  knows  the  tremendous  strain 
put  on  heart  and  brain  by  "the  spirit  of  the  age,"  as 
this  merciless  tyrant  is  called.  It  is  seen  in  the  hurry- 
ing, forcing  system  of  education;  in  the  short  cuts 
into  professions;  in  the  multiplication  of  summer 
schools  and  universities,  to  which  already  over  worked 
teachers  repair  to  learn  Hebrew,  discuss  philosophy, 
and  study  natural  sciences ;  in  the  extension  and 
popularity  of  the  lecture  system,  distinctively  an 
American  idea,  and  in  other  ways  that  need  not  be 
signalized. 

2.  Not  to  dwell  on  this  feature,  we  may  add  the 
Practicalness,  the  utilitarian  character  of  American 


Flexibility  of  American  Life.  143 

life.  We  are  not  only  audacious,  venturesome,  fond 
of  big  things,  but  shrewd,  adroit  and  calculating. 
"  Will  it  pay  ?"  is  the  crucial  test  to  which  everything 
is  put.  The  calculating  shrewdness  of  the  typical 
Yankee  is  still  a  dominating  force  in  the  central  and 
frontier  States,  though  he  has  largely  disappeared 
from  his  own  New  England.  The  necessities  of  a 
new  and  colossal  empire  of  amazing  dimensions  and 
capabilities,  have  made  him  awake  to  the  importance 
of  the  coarse  arts,  rather  than  the  fine  arts.  But  lat- 
terly, particularly  since  business  recovered  from  the 
effects  of  the  Rebellion,  streams  of  wealth  have 
flowed  into  the  repositories  of  art  and  schools  of  learn- 
ing. It  is  seen  to  "  pay  "  to  liberally  endow  universi- 
ties and  enrich  art  galleries.  A  new  and  brighter 
era  is  now  opening  in  this  direction.  This  suggests, 

3.  The  Flexibility  of  American  life,  its  power  of 
adaptation  to  varying  exigencies,  social  and  national. 
This  is  to  be  expected  in  a  free  democracy  where 
there  is  no  fixed  stereotyped  way  of  doing  things,  as 
in  monarchial  communities  where  the  iron  sway  of 
precedent  keeps  everything  "as  it  was  in  the  begin- 
ning, is  now,  and  ever  shall  be,  world  without  end." 
New  ideas  are  not  necessarily  revolutionary,  but 
government,  business  and  social  customs  are  gauged 
by  common  sense  and  present  needs. 

Once  more,  the  Cosmopolitan  character  of  American 
society  is  a  modifying  influence  of  great  importance. 
The  insular  prejudices  and  contracted  ideas  imported 


144  Vocal  and  Musical  Culture. 

from  other  communities  very  soon  melt  in  the  coales- 
cence and  fusion  of  the  many  varied  and  vigorous 
elements  that  are  nourished  and  assimilated  in  this 
Eepublic.  This  also  stands  related  to  the  growth  of 
art,  literature  and  religion.  It  will,  indeed,  require  a 
vigorous  digestion  to  assimilate  so  many  heterogen- 
eous elements  and  preserve  any  individuality  and  in- 
tegrity of  existence.  But  the  fact  remains,  and  with 
that  alone  are  we  at  present  concerned.  Now,  in  a 
few  particulars,  let  us  apply  these  considerations  to 
the  development  of  Musical  and  Rhetorical  culture. 

As  to  oratory.  We  should  expect  to  find  orators  in 
a  country  with  such  physical  features,  climatic  con- 
ditions, and  political  history.  Such  is  the  fact.  From 
the  days  of  Patrick  Henry  and  other  orators  of  the 
Revolution,  America  has  had,  till  now,  a  splendid  suc- 
cession of  eloquent  men  in  the  pulpit,  the  senate,  the 
bar,  and  the  forum.  Webster,  Clay,  Calhoun,  Everett 
and  Choate  have  passed  away  from  political  circles, 
as  Beecher  and  Gough  from  pulpit  and  platform,  but 
the  times  will  create  others.  We  need  not  argue  the 
fact,  we  only  note  certain  features,  of  American 
eloquence. 

1.  We  should  expect  impassioned  utterance.  It  is 
so.  The  typical  speaker  is  apt  to  be  florid  in  style, 
positive  in  tone,  and  free  in  gesticulation.  An  emi- 
nent physician  and  psychologist  says,  "American 
oratory  is  partly  the  product  of  American  nervous- 
ness. For  success  in  the  loftier  phases  of  oratory,  fine- 


Independence  of  Thought.  145 

ness  of  organization,  and  a  touch  of  the  nervous 
diathesis  are  essential.  Delicacy  of  organization 
united  with  Saxon  force  makes  America  a  nation  of 
orators." 

2.  Independence  of  character,  nurtured  by  a  repub- 
lic where  there  are  no  titled  or  privileged  classes,  ex- 
presses itself  in  the  tones  of  voice  and  inflections, 
even  in  ordinary  conversation,  yes,  in  one's  "walk 
and  conversation."  The  writer  has  dwelt  on  these 
points  in  his  volume,  "Drill  Book  in  Vocal  Culture/' 
to  be  found  in  our  library,  and  need  not  expand  the 
idea  at  this  time.  The  speed  of  speech  and  pitch  of 
voice  are  diagnostic.  The  influence  of  easterly  winds, 
catarrh,  phthisis,  particularly  in  the  Atlantic  States, 
and  of  certain  dietetic  transgressions  as  related  to 
vocal  purity,  are  considered  in  the  same  connection. 

Once  more,  ecclesiastical  architecture  modifies  pul- 
pit elocution.  Cathedrals,  and  long,  narrow  sanctua- 
ries, built  for  processional  and  other  spectacular  pur- 
poses, are  unfit  for  teaching  or  preaching.  Americana 
are  introducing  the  semi-circular  style  into  their  audi- 
ence rooms.  Again,  the  extemporaneous  prayer  and 
unwritten  discourse  render  impossible  the  sing- song- 
and  the  drawl  which  are  cultivated  in  some  estab- 
lished churches.  The  growth  of  the  lecture  system, 
before  alluded  to,  tends  to  encourage  a  natural  and 
colloquial  style  of  delivery,  ease  of  movement  on  the 
part  of  speakers  and  a  friendly  interest  on  the  part  of 
audiences.  The  old  New  England  "town-meeting" 


146  Vocal  and  Musical  Culture. 

and  the  everywhere  popular  camp-meeting,  with  its 
out-door  speech  and  song  in  the  forests,  along  the 
lake  side,  and  the  sea,  are  American  institutions  that 
have  had,  and  are  still  having  a  palpable  influence 
in  fostering  what  is  peculiar  in  American  vocal  art. 

Of  late  years  the  continental  conservatory  system 
of  musical  and  elocutionary  instruction  has  done 
much  to  elevate  the  tone  of  culture  and  to  give  prom- 
ise of  future  progress  in  musical  art.  Musical  con- 
ventions, continued  for  several  days  for  the  purpose 
of  instruction  and  practice,  and  the  introduction  of 
teachers  of  music  among  the  millions  now  in  the  pub- 
lic, free  schools  of  America,  and  the  advance  of  the 
tonic-sol-fa  system,  all  point  to  a  fruitful  future. 

To  realize  the  best  results  we  must  aim  at  a  popular 
culture.  Music  is  not  to  be  monopolized.  Like  the 
air,  whose  vibrations  create  it,  it  ministers  to  all. 
"The  wind  that  rushes  through  the  organ  of  St. 
George's  Chapel,  at  Windsor,  has  first  passed  through 
the  barrel  organ  of  some  poor  Italian  boy.  The  voice 
of  Jenny  Lind  and  that  of  the  street  singer,  have  but 
one  common  capital  to  draw  on,  the  unsectarian, 
catholic  atmosphere,  the  failure  of  which  would  be 
the  extinction  of  a  Handel,  Haydn  or  Mozart."  Amer- 
ica presents  a  fine  field  for  such  popular  development 
of  vocal  and  musical  art.  Extravagances  and  crudi 
ties  can  be  occasionally  tolerated,  as  our  cannon 
jubilee  concerts,  where  10,000,  even  20,000,  singers  and 
players  have  had  their  music  punctuated  by  the  ex- 


A  Christian  Culture.  147 

plosion  of  field  pieces  outside  the  Coliseum.  These 
sensational  entertainments  give  an  impulse  to  musical 
education. 

An  early  culture  is  another  requisite.  The  practice 
of  song  should  be  contemporaneous  with  that  of 
speech.  In  the  family  and  school  a  taste  can  be  early 
fostered  which  may  be  an  initial  step  in  the  path  of 
future  eminent  success. 

Finally,  to  subserve  the  highest  ends  of  vocal  art, 
it  should  be  a  Christian  culture  we  aim  at.  Espec- 
ially is  this  the  imperative  duty  of  the  Anglo-Saxon 
race,  whose  regnant  influence  in  the  world's  civiliza- 
tion is  everywhere  recognized.  In  America,  above 
all,  where  life  is  so  vehement  and  intense ;  so  cosmo- 
politan and  mixed,  yet  where  there  is  such  freedom 
and  elasticity,  the  power  of  adaptation  to  changing 
conditions,  and  where  the  supremacy  of  English 
thought  is  still  unquestioned ;  this  yet  new  and  forma- 
tive civilization  is  a  field  for  the  development  of  art 
under  most  promising  conditions. 

In  securing  this  end,  her  educators  gladly  welcome 
the  alliance  of  their  elder  brethren  across  the  sea. 
Offspring  of  a  common  stock,  inheritors  of  a  common 
language,  literature  and  religion,  and  custodians 
alike  of  those  priceless  principles  which  are  the 
world's  only  hope,  we  are  glad  to  join  hands  in  effort 
as  well  as  hearts  in  sympathy  and  minds  in  council. 
In  all  that  refines  and  exalts  humanity,  in  religion, 
law,  philosophy,  science  and  art,  poetry,  music  and 


148  Vocal  and  Musical  Culture. 

eloquence,  our  earliest  lessons  have  been  learned  to- 
gether of  one  common  Mother.  May  our  only  con- 
tention and  rivalry  in  coming  years  be  this,  each  to 
surpass  the  other  in  giving  to  the  world  the  wealth 
of  wisdom  so  richly  received  from  her  royal  hand. 

NOTE. — The  SOCIETY  OF  SCIENCE,  LETTERS  AND  AET,  OF  LONDON, 
organized  1881,  for  the  promotion  of  sound  learning,  urgently  invites 
the  co-operation  of  all  scholars  in  their  work,  by  correspondence, 
membership,  contributions  of  original  articles,  books,  scientific  and 
bibliographic  data  of  all  kinds.  Address  DR.  E.  A.  STURMAN,  M.A., 
F.RS.L.,  160  Holland  Road,  Kensington,  London,  W. ;  or  PROF.  E. 
P.  THWING,  M.D.,  Pn.D.,  156  St.  Marks  Avenue,  Brooklyn,  K  Y., 
Resident  Fellow. 

American  students,  whose  examinations  are  conducted  by  a  Fellow 
of  the  London  Society,  will  receive  its  certificates,  or  medals  in  silver 
or  bronze,  if  their  papers  reach  the  required  standard.  [Copy  of  Gold 
Medal  Awrard]  "This  is  to  certify  that,  at  the  ordinary  meeting  holden 
on  Oct.  18,  1887,  at  Addison  Hall,  Kensington,  SIR  FRANCIS  KNOWLES, 
Bart.,  D.  C.  L.,  F.  R.  S.,  in  the  chair,  it  was  unanimously  Besolved: 
That  the  Society's  Medal  for  Literary  and  Scientific  Merit  be  awarded 
to  PROFESSOR  E.  P.  TEWING,  M.D.,  of  Brooklyn,  U.S.A." 


THE  WORKS  01  CANOVA. 


A  UNIVERSITY  THESIS. 

Presented  by  the  author  in  his  final  examination  in  Philosophy  and  Fine 
Arts  for  the  Doctrate  of  Philosophy. 


Thomas  Carlyle  has  truly  said  that  "it  is  essential 
to  right  judgment  on  a  man  or  his  works  that  we  see 
his  good  qualities  before  we  pronounce  upon  his  bad." 
Many  a  hierophant  of  art  ignores  this  canon  of  criti- 
cism. The  interpreter  of  her  mysteries  needs  a  clear 
vision  and  a  candid  heart.  The  Florentines,  in  the 
days  of  Galileo,  were  challenged  by  him  to  look 
through  his  telescope  and  see  for  themselves  the  satel- 
lites of  Jupiter.  Knowing  well  that  this  would  fur- 
nish contributary,  if  not  conclusive,  evidence  to  sup- 
port the  "heresy"  of  Copernicanism,  they  refused  to 
look.  So,  when  the  signal  for  recall  was  flung  out  at 
Copenhagen,  Kelson,  led  by  a  sublime  prescience  of 
victory,  refused  to  look  at  the  order,  and  only  turned 
his  blind  eye  thitherward.  He  could  therefore  evas- 
ively say,  "I  looked  and  saw  no  signal."  Like  Nel- 
son, there  are  censors  who  carry  with  them  a  blind 


150  The  Works  of  Canova. 

eye  for  the  inspection  of  what  they  have  already  pre- 
judged. As  one  has  said,  "Their  pens  are  poniards, 
and  their  inkstands  fountains  of  detraction."  They 
seem  to  think  that  one  can  only  validate  his  claim  to 
be  a  reviewer  by  severity  of  censure,  whereas  candid 
criticism  involves  commendation  as  well  as  com- 
plaint, an  open  eye  for  beauty  as  well  as  for  blemish. 
With  this  initial  thought  in  mind  we  come  to  the 
consideration  of  the  works  of  the  illustrious  sculptor, 
ANTONIO  CANOVA.  The  writer  takes  up  the  theme 
which  has  been  assigned  to  him  with  deep  satisfac- 
tion, for  it  is  not  wholly  foreign  to  his  thought  and 
observation.  During  frequent  visits  abroad  he  has 
lingered  before  the  productions  of  antique  and  mod- 
ern art  as  seen  all  over  Europe,  from  the  Hermitage 
of  Catherine  in  Kussia  to  the  Koyal  galleries  of 
Madrid,  and  noted  the  impressions  made  by  their 
most  conspicuous  examples.  On  a  visit  made  to  the 
grand  basilica  of  Rome  in  1879,  it  was  not  the  impos- 
ing facade  of  St.  Peters',  the  noble  colonnade,  the 
lofty  dome  above,  or  "the  frozen  music"  of  architec- 
ture below,  that  held  him  entranced,  so  much  as  it 
was  a  kneeling  figure  in  marble  by  CANOVA,  that 
lighted  up  the  dusky  shadows  of  that  sacred  spot  as 
with  a  vision  of  the  skies !  This  figure  and  this 
name,  alone  found  record  in  his  notes  of  the  garnered 
wealth  of  centuries  in  that  treasure  house  of  art.  He 
could  adopt  the  language  of  that  eminent  critic, 
Joseph  Forsyth,  "I  saw  some  admired  pictures,  but 


Canova's  Life.  151 

none  that  left  any  impression  on  me.  The  only  Vene- 
tian artist  that  could  impress  my  soul,  or  awake  its 
affections,  is  CANOVA.  All  the  artists  in  Rome  yield 
the  palm  to  Can  ova." 

His  LIFE. — The  years  1757  and  1822  mark  the 
boundaries  of  his  toilful  and  productive  life.  Ee 
left  his  early  home,  under  the  shadows  of  the  Vene- 
tian Alps,  as  an  orphan,  to  study  first  with  Pasino,  a 
kinsman,  and  then  with  Gio  Ferrari,  a  pupil  of  one  of 
the  best  Venetian  sculptors.  He  executed,  when  but 
thirteen  years  of  age,  two  works  in  marble,  represent- 
ing baskets  of  fruit,  which  are  shown  in  the  Farsetti 
palace.  Two  years  later  his  "Eurydice"  was  com- 
pleted and  was  at  once  followed  by  his  "Orpheus." 
In  1780  Canova  began  work  at  Rome.  He  was  aided 
for  three  years  by  a  pension  from  the  Venetian  sen- 
ate. "Theseus,"  "Apollo"  and  "Psyche"  elicited 
hearty  encomiums,  even  from  the  most  exacting 
critics.  Onward  from  this  time  he  toiled  with  grow- 
ing zeal,  proof  of  which  is  had  in  the  fact  that,  in 
twenty  years,  he  had  completed  more  works  than 
many  sculptors  have  executed  in  a  life  time.  The 
incessant  strain  told  on  his  health.  The  use  of  the 
trapano  pressing  on  his  chest  is  believed  by  the 
Countess  of  Albrizzo  to  have  originated  the  disease, 
cancer  of  the  stomach,  to  which  he  finally  yielded. 
A  temporary  sojourn  in  Germany  gave  him  relief  and 
an  opportunity  to  study  Germanic  art.  He  went  to 
Paris  in  1802  to  model  the  portrait  of  Bonaparte. 


152  The  Works  of  Canova. 

The  colossal  marble  statue  was  taken  to  the  banks  of 
the  Thames,  and  a  bronze  copy  went  to  Milan.  Bona- 
parte was  no  less  pleased  with  Can  ova's  personal 
qualities  than  his  artistic,  and  allowed  him  great 
freedom  of  speech,  more  than  to  his  own  marshals. 
Asking  him  why  Antonius  Pius  had  so  many  busts 
everywhere,  Canova  replied  that  he  was  a  sovereign 
with  so  many  virtues  that  everyone  loved  him. 

Summoned  to  Vienna  to  place  the  sepulchre  of  the 
Archduchess  Christina  in  the  Church  of  the  Augus- 
tines,  he  increased  his  fame  already  widely  spread. 
In  1815  the  Roman  government  appointed  him  to 
superintend  the  removal  of  works  of  antique  art 
from  Paris  to  Rome.  The  opposition  was  great.  He 
was  even  threatened  with  assassination.  His  quiet 
resolution  prevailed,  and  the  work  was  done  in  a  week. 
The  Pope  made  him  Marquis  of  Ischia  and  settled  a 
pension  of  3,000  crowns  annually.  He  returned 
thanks  for  the  honor  and  reward,  but  said  that  he 
had  always  supported  himself  by  his  own  labor  and 
would  therefore  devote  this  sum,  as  he  did,  to  the 
education  of  students  in  the  Academy  of  Sculpture 
at  Rome. 

In  the  last  years  of  his  life  he  planned  to  erect  and 
adorn  a  church  edifice  in  his  native  town  at  the  ex- 
pense of  $60,000.  He  died  before  its  completion,  at 
Venice,  Oct.  13,  1822,  at  the  age  of  64.  His  departure 
was  peaceful.  Those  who  moistened  his  dying  lips 
caught  these  last  words,  as  of  invocation  or  of  solil- 


Character  of  Canova.  153 

oquy,  "Anima  bella  e  pura!"  "Pure  and  lovely 
spirit."  He  passed  away  without  a  struggle.  His 
visage  remained  radiant  and  expressive,  "as  if  his 
mind  was  absorbed  in  some  sublime  conception ;  an 
appearance  that  created  a  powerful  impression  on 
those  who  stood  about  him."  Fabre's  portrait  makes 
his  face  one  of  strong  yet  pleasing  features,  with 
broad  forehead,  beaming  eyes,  shaven  lips  and  cheeks, 
curly  hair  and  animated  expression.  He  was  never 
married,  but  wholly  devoted  to  his  art.  He  was 
frugal,  regular  and  temperate;  benevolent  to  poor 
artists,  their  families  and  orphans ;  modest  and  gen- 
tle in  his  bearing,  full  of  natural  urbanity.  Though 
petted  and  praised  by  the  great,  and  decorated  by 
imperial  patrons,  as  well  as  honored  by  the  leading 
societies  of  Europe,  he  was  not  puffed  up,  but  bore 
his  honors  with  grace  and  amiability. 

He  wrought  with  method  and  assiduity,  first  out- 
lining his  thoughts  on  paper  and  then  sketching  his 
work  in  clay  or  wax,  finally  transferring  the  figure  to 
a  full-sized  model.  While  at  work,  Canova  would 
have  some  one  read  to  him.  He  thus  made  himself 
not  only  proficient  in  Italian  literature,  but  in  the 
classics.  Polybius  and  Tacitus  were  his  favorites.  ^ 
Canova's  own  speech  was  like  that  of  Nestor,  as 
described  by  Homer, 

"Words,  sweet  as  honey,  from  his  lips  distilled." 

In  his  first  lecture  before  the  Royal  Academy,  after 
the  death  of  Canova,  Sir  Richard  West  remarked 


154  The  Works  of  Canova. 

that  Italy  could  not  justly  call  him  hers  alone.  "All 
Europe  justly  claims  the  kindred,  and  acknowledges 
the  loss,"  for  it  was  Canova  who  emancipated  Italy 
from  the  fantastic  conceits  and  exaggerations  of 
the  Bernini  school,  replaced  sculpture  on  its  proper 
basis  and  was  the  true  restorer  of  legitimate  art." 
Sir  Richard  admits  that  Canova  sometimes  seduces 
us  by  the  luxuriance  of  his  execution  rather  than  by 
originality  of  invention,  and  erred  in  exalting  finish 
and  technical  details  above  real  breadth  and  nobility 
of  form.  The  morbidezza,  wantonness,  softness,  was 
occasionally  heightened  by  reddening  the  lips  and 
cheeks,  as  in  his  Yenus  and  Sleeping  Endymion,  "a 
meretricious  and  dangerous  innovation,  happily  not 
received  with  favor."  These,  however,  were  excres- 
cences which  were  not  characteristics,  for  he  ordi- 
narily showed  that  he  felt  what  belonged  to  the  digni- 
ty of  art,  and  he  was,  as  Sir  Richard  adds,  "simple  in 
arrangements  and  sparing  in  ornament,  so  that  the 
eye  should  not  be  distracted  by  the  pomp  of  extrava- 
gance or  unnecessary  matter."  His  faults  were  venial- 
says  that  sharp  critic,  John  Flaxman.  "His  genius 
added  lustre  to  his  own  age,  while  his  wisdom  com- 
mands the  admiration  of  succeeding  ages."  He  is 
most  perfect  who  has  the  fewest  faults,  for  absolute 
perfection  is  not  attainable.  In  Canova,  this  English 
critic  extols  the  grace  of  his  figures,  the  strength  of 
muscle,  the  soft,  yielding  appearance  of  the  flesh  and 
the  power  and  delicacy  of  execution  throughout. 


Candor  needed.  155 

His  WORKS. — We  shall  now  pass  in  review  some  of 
the  more  notable  figures  and  groups  of  this  sculptor 
and  study  their  salient  features.  It  is  well  ever  to 
keep  in  mind  that  temperament,  as  well  as  prevail- 
ing tastes,  will  shape  our  judgment.  Artist  and  critic 
alike  come  under  this  law.  Schiller  and  Goethe, 
Michael  Angelo  and  Raphael,  Velazquez  and  Murillo 
are  not  more  unlike  than  are  their  censors.  What 
one  delights  in,  only  disgusts  another.  National  bias, 
provincial  tastes  and  mercenary  views  also  help  to 
shape  criticism.  Americans  are  fond  of  amplitude, 
strength  and  brilliancy,  forgetting  that  a  big  thing  is 
not  necessarily  a  great  thing,  and  that  sensational 
themes  in  art,  as  well  as  in  oratory,  may  so  far  daz- 
zle the  senses  as  to  blind  them  to  poverty  of  design 
and  inanity  of  feeling.  It  is  Jarves  who  somewhere 
points  out  the  danger  coming  from  our  prejudices, 
from  fashion  and  the  materialistic  temper  of  our  age 
and  our  pursuits.  He  shows  how  these  mislead  in 
art.  They  doubtless  misled  Canova.  His  works 
should  be  viewed  in  the  light  of  his  times.  Loyalty 
to  nature  and  the  enthronement  of  a  moral  purpose 
were  then,  and  are  now  needed  as  regenerative  ele- 
ments. No  scenic  devices  can  cover  the  lack  of  an 
inward  principle.  Without  it  artists  will  only  aim  to 
please,  and  stoop  to  what  Ruskin  calls  "slop  work, 
conventional  dulness,  cookery,  Peter-Parley  style 
and  infant  school  drawing."  The  sweeping  censures 
of  Ruskin  are  comparatively  harmless  on  account  of 


156  The  Works  of  Canova. 

their  exaggeration.  He  calls  Raphael  hard  names, 
and  sneers  at  his  "  vapid  fineries,"  the  "  tasteless 
poison  of  the  art"  of  the  prince  of  painters.  So 
Jarves  calls  Canova  "the  chief  of  classic  pedants, 
who  presume  to  act  as  plausible  guides  to  the  an- 
tique, but  mislead  our  conceptions  of  it." 

Now  it  is  barely  possible  that  the  aesthetic  culture 
of  these  gentlemen  may  have  been  developed  at  the 
expense  of  other  instincts.  Our  deepest  life  is  justly 
regarded  as  inarticulate,  and  when  an  artist  can 
touch  that,  he  is  master.  A  connoisseur  may  sit  in 
judgment  as  to  criticial  details,  while  he  narrows  his 
imaginative  and  emotional  capacity.  "The  eye  sees 
all  that  it  brings  power  to  see,"  says  Carlyle.  Beranger 
tells  of  a  prisoner  who,  gazing  into  the  embers  of  his 
expiring  fire,  sees  a  floating  wreck,  a  flying  eagle, 
with  other  pyrotechnic  beauties  that  his  fancy  formed. 
Victor  Hugo  in  one  of  his  romances  tells  of  Grin- 
goire,  who  saw  star-worlds  in  fire  sparks  as  they 
sprinkled  the  sooty  chimney  back.  He  would  sit  for 
hours  enjoying  the  visions  and  the  reveries  awakened. 
The  undefinable  in  art  refuses  to  be  bounded  by  the 
canons  of  intellectual  criticism.  The  imagination 
alone  penetrates  this  territory.  Poetry  and  music 
minister  to  the  inarticulate  life  and  why  should  not 
sculpture  ? 

Writing  of  the  nude  in  marble,  Canova  says,  "It 
should  express  itself  only  in  the  most  choice  and 
beautiful  forms,  with  the  most  noble  and  attractive 


Natural  Grace.  15? 

graces  that  nature  or  an  inspired  fancy  can  supply." 
He  remarks  that  nature  has  every  variety  of  perfec- 
tion if  we  know  where  to  find  it,  and  urged  his  pupils 
to  infuse  life  into  their  studies  from  the  living  form. 
No  wonder  that  an  Englishman  in  Canova's  studio 
at  Home  exclaimed,  as  he  approached  a  marble 
nymph,  "What  a  pity  she  cannot  speak  !"  The  artist 
modestly  replied  that  he  did  not  aim  to  deceive  the 
beholder  by  making  marble  seem  to  be  flesh,  for  were 
it  so,  "it  would  be  no  longer  admired  as  a  work  of 
art  and  the  skill  of  the  artist  would  be  unnoticed.  I 
would  excite  the  fancy  only  and  not  deceive  the  eye. 
I  am  content  if  it  is  felt  that  I  have  subdued  in  some 
degree  the  stubborn  material  by  my  art,  and  made  it 
approximate  to  the  life."  A  merely  cold  form  gave 
him  a  death-like  chill,  he  said,  and  so  he  aimed  to 
"add  mind  to  it,  to  borrow  from  inspiration  that 
nobleness  of  life  which  I  want."  He  said  that  he  did 
not  satisfy  himself,  and  saw  it  was  impossible  to 
satisfy  his  critics,  by  whom  he  was  "pulled  in  pieces." 
The  most  merciless  of  them  admit  the  exquisite 
finish  of  his  marbles,  the  grace  of  contour  and  pose, 
but  seem  to  think  that  Canova  could  only  express 
prettiness  and  affectation,  feminine  charms  and  gen- 
tle movements.  We  will  therefore  instance  the  group 
"Hercules  and  Lichas"  as  an  embodiment  of  terrific 
power  and  rage.  Maddened  by  the  poisoned  vest 
brought  by  the  youth  sent  by  the  JEtolian  princess, 
Hercules  dashes  the  messenger  into  the  sea  from  the 


158  The  Works  of  Canova. 

summit  of  JEta.  The  attitude  of  the  hero  as  he 
clenches  him  by  the  hair  and  the  foot ;  the  physical 
suffering  and  the  towering  rage  expressed,  and  the 
fright  of  the  innocent  victim  swung  in  air — instinct- 
ively clutching  for  protection  to  a  sacred  altar  as  his 
inverted  body  is  poised  an  instant  before  it  is  hurled 
like  a  stone  from  a  sling — all  present  a  harrowing 
picture  to  the  eye. 

"Creugas  and  Damoxenus"  is  another  piece  of 
sculpture  into  which  Canova  throws  the  tragic  ele- 
ment. These  two  Sicilian  boxers  had  consumed  a 
whole  day  in  boxing.  They  agreed  to  give  each  other 
a  final  blow  without  flinching.  Creugas  first  struck 
his  comrade  on  the  head.  Damoxenus  then  unfairly 
extended  and  stiffened  his  hand,  and  gave  a  blow  with 
his  hard,  horny  nails  on  the  side  of  Creugas.  It  came 
with  such  fearful  violence  as  to  cut  through  his 
bowels,  which  Damoxenus  tore  out  of  the  dying  man. 
The  record  Pausanias  gives  is  too  revolting  to  dwell 
upon,  and  the  story  in  marble  is  not  a  pleasant  one  to 
inspect,  although  the  sanguinary  features  are  not 
revealed,  for  the  sculptor  chose  to  picture  the  pugi- 
lists the  instant  before  the  fatal  blow  falls.  The 
brutal  character  of  Damoxenus  is  shown  in  his  figure, 
attitude  and  facial  expression.  The  face  of  Creugas 
propitiates  us  in  his  favor.  We  are  glad  to  know 
that  his  murderer  was  driven  into  perpetual  exile. 

There  are  some  minds  that  relish  the  rueful,  sullen 
and  even  sickening  scenes  of  life,  but  the  remark  of 


Enlivening  Art.  159 

Chad  wick  is  hardly  just,  that  "  modern  art  has  a 
predilection  for  the  painful  and  horrible,"  as  of  old, 
when  John  of  Pisa  sculptured  "  devils  who  leer  and 
writhe  and  crunch  and  tear,"  and  others  multiplied 
crosses  hung  with  "green  and  macerated  Christs." 
It  is  true  we  have  had  Rembrandt  Peale  and  his 
"Court  of  Death,"  and  not  a  few  ghastly  pictures  by 
Dore,  but  these  productions  are  no  more  typical  of 
modern  art  than  are  our  comic  papers  representative 
of  the  prevailing  temper  of  the  age.  Canova,  like 
Raphael,  preferred  to  minister  to  the  emotions  that 
enliven  and  cheer  rather  than  to  those  that  awe  or 
depress.  In  one  of  his  essays  he  says  that  those 
works  of  real  merit  that  affect  us,  do  so,  not  by  the 
beauty  which  satisfies  our  critical  instinct,  but  by 
that  which  captivates  and  subdues  the  heart,  awaken- 
ing tenderness,  joy  or  sorrow.  Canova's  ozii  suoi 
(his  recreations)  were  delineations  of  female  loveli- 
ness, often  voluptuous  and  fascinating,  not  to  say 
wanton,  yet  avoiding  the  extravagance  and  license 
of  the  imitators  of  Angelo  and  Raphael.  He  well 
understood  the  mechanical  conditions  of  his  art.  He 
saw  that  the  dull  tints  of  stone,  the  greenish  hue  of 
bronze  and  the  luminous  brightness  of  alabaster  and 
marble  have  each  a  different  feeling.  The  material 
affects  the  work  and  our  conception  of  it.  The  loca- 
tion also.  If  his  work  were  to  be  placed  in  the  light, 
and  near  the  beholder,  Canova  saw  that  it  would  re- 
quire one  kind  of  treatment ;  if  far  above  the  eye  or 


160  The  Works  of  Canova. 

in  a  shadowy  recess,  other  principles  would  apply, 
The  matter  of  drapery,  too,  was  a  study  with  Canova. 
As  words  are  the  attire  of  thought,  and  come  to  our 
ears  as  a  beggar  or  a  prince  comes  to  our  door,  so  he 
knew  how  to  dignify  or  debase,  how  to  soothe  and 
charm,  or  shock  and  anger  by  the  drapery  of  his  sub- 
jects. Its  fineness  or  coarseness,  its  freedom  or 
rigidity,  its  simplicity  or  its  grotesqueness,  its  historic 
truthfulness  or  absurdity,  are  points  which  he  care- 
fully studied.  He  evidently  wet  the  drapery  of  the 
model  as  other  artists  did,  to  show  the  form  as  re- 
vealed by  bathers  on  the  beach.  This  is  noticeable 
in  the  figure  of  Hebe,  whose  robe,  knotted  at  the 
waist,  descends  as  light  and  tenuous  as  a  cloud  about 
her  person,  the  outline  of  which  is  not  obscured  by 
the  transparent  envelope.  His  use  of  corrosives  to 
give  peculiar  finish  to  the  marble,  has  been  criticised 
as  finical  and  pretentious,  but  why  is  it  any  more  ob- 
jectionable than  the  device  of  a  wet  model  ?<2) 

There  is,  of  course,  peril  in  all  these  manipulations 
and  devices  in  which  these  masters  of  sculpture  in- 
dulged. (3>  When  we  look  at  the  neat  sandals  and 
smoothly  laid  curl  on  the  cheek  of  the  rough  fisher- 
man that  had  toiled  all  night  in  the  slimy  shallop,  as 
represented  in  Raphael's  "Charge  to  Peter,"  or  gaze 
on  the  insipid  languor  of  some  of  Fra  Angelico's 
"fleshless  angels,  boneless  saints  and  bloodless  vir- 
gins," though  painted  by  the  "St.  John  of  art,"  we 
see  how  the  greatest  genius  may  sometimes  repeat 


Unmanliness  in  Art.  161 

the    folly  which     Shakespeare   signalizes — in  King 
John,  Act  IV.,  Sc.  2— and  attempt 

"To  gild  refined  gold,  to  paint  the  lily, 
To  throw  a  perfume  on  the  violet, 
To  smooth  the  ice,  or  add  another  hue 
Unto  the  rainbow,  or  with  taper  light 
To  seek  the  beauteous  eye  of  heaven  to  garnish. " 

Sometimes  this  prettiness  is  proof  of  inanity,  some- 
times of  ambition,  but  often  of  an  unworthy  condes- 
cension to  uncultivated  judgments,  such  as  a  popular 
preacher  once  confessed  to,  when  his  methods  were 
criticised  by  a  friend,  "  We  should  doubtless  agree  in 
the  matter  of  taste,  but  then,  I  know  my  crowd!" 

Canova's  "Hebe"  at  Berlin  and  "Psyche"  at  Milan 
are  among  his  best  works.  They  show  his  skill  in 
modelling  and  fineness  of  touch;  the  felicity  and 
grace  of  motion  and  gesture,  and  the  refinement  of 
nature  of  which  these  forms  are  indices.  The  celes- 
tial Psyche  and  the  languid  softness  of  Cupid  are 
finely  contrasted  in  the  erect  attitude  of  the  one  and 
the  yielding  inclination  of  the  other.  The  drapery 
of  Hebe,  pressed  against  her  person,  suggests  more 
of  delicate  beauty  than  the  nude  figure.  It  calls  to 
mind  the  sonnet  of  Ippolito  Pindemonte : 

"Whither,  celestial  Hebe,  dost  thou  stray, 

Leaving  the  banquet  of  eternal  Jove  ? 

Deign 'st  thou  to  change  the  radiant  fields  above 
To  tread  earth's  dark  and  ignoble  way  ? 
Immortal  sculptor  !  who  do'st  yet  outvie 

ftalian  art  and  readiest  Attic  grace, 

Life's  soft  and  breathing  aspect  thou  couldst  trace  ; 


162  The  Works  of  Canova. 

In  sculptured  motion  cheat  the  wond'ring  eye. 
Back  from  that  form  on  which  entranced  we  gaze, 

Her  vestments  seem  to  natter  in  the  wind, 

Buoyant  in  many  a  graceful  fold  behind ; 
While  Nature's  self,  whose  law  the  world  obeys, 
Deceived  by  mimic  art,  believes  a  stone 
With  motion  gifted,  swiftly  passing  on. ' ' 

The  statue  of  Palamades  tells  another  story  of 
Grecian  life  and  art.  Socrates  is  said  to  have  singled 
out  this  hero  and  martyr  as  one  whom  he  hoped  to 
meet  in  the  future  life,  for  he  was  a  man  of  wisdom, 
rectitude  and  purity,  a  man  whom  his  country  un- 
justly condemned  to  death.  These  virtues  seem  to 
speak  forth  in  the  serene  repose  and  dignity  of  his 
erect  and  pliant  form.  Soon  after  the  completion  of 
the  statue,  while  Canova  stood  by  it,  its  support  gave 
way.  The  marble  figure  fell  and  was  broken  in 
many  pieces,  very  nearly  involving  the  artist  himself 
in  destruction.  A  fine  engraving  by  Henry  Moses  is 
preserved  in  Canova's  life  by  Count  Cicognara  [H. 
G.  Bohn,  1849,  London.] 

In  executing  this  work  he  anticipated  what  Dr. 
Knox  of  the  French  Academy  has  since  said,  speak- 
ing of  schools  of  art,  "There  is  but  one,  that  of 
Nature,  though  to  read  her  volume  profitably  one 
must  study  Greek  and  Italian  art,  and  so  learn  to 
wisely  follow  nature  in  inward  structure  and  outward 
form ;  in  her  intentions  as  well  as  in  her  forthcom- 
ings. Merely  to  imitate  the  highest  art  is  mannerism, 
while  to  attempt  to  improve  on  it  is  sure  to  result  in 
caricature  and  failure." 


A  Reformer  of  Art.  163 

The  Bernini  style  of  a  previous  century  showed  a 
lack  of  conscientiousness ;  it  was  naturalistic,  sensa- 
tional, passionate  and  ostentatious.  Jesuitism  sought 
to  attract  the  gaze  of  the  curious  by  the  glowing 
ecstacy,  shown  in  their  altar  pieces,  and  by  other 
forms  of  spectacular  seduction.  In  the  beautiful 
forms  of  Correggio,  there  are  seen  germs  of  this  de- 
generacy. Canova  did  much  to  reform  plastic  art 
from  the  maudlin  and  sensual  temper  which  had,  be- 
fore his  day,  so  widely  prevailed.  That  he  should 
occasionally  fall  into  the  theatric  mannerism  of  his 
predecessors  is  not  to  be  wondered  at.  But  viewing 
him  as  a  reformer,  whose  aim  seemed  to  be  to  intro- 
duce a  purer  and  more  healthful  life,  we  can  overlook 
his  blemishes  and  at  least  commend  his  purpose.  In 
his  "Clement  XIV."  he  "touches  a  genuinely  plastic 
key,"  says  Liibke,  and  shows  "earnestness  and  dig- 
nity. Clement  XIII.  is  nobly  conceived,  with  serious 
simplicity  and  solemn  repose.  We  are  transported 
to  a  purer  atmosphere."  His  fertile  fancy  and  his 
graceful  touch  are  seen  in  the  accessories  of  this  last 
named  tomb  in  St.  Peter's.  The  crouching  lions  that 
guard  the  entrance  are  admirably  executed. 

His  ' '  Religion"  and  "  Pieta,"  wrought  for  the  church 
he  built  for  Possagno,  show  him  not  only  "Instinct 
with  active  thought  and  moved  Parnassian  dreams," 
but  filled  with  something  of  Christian  sentiment  as 
well,  although  it  is  easy  to  find  fault  with  the  some- 
what pretentious  robes  and  halo  about  "Religion." 


164  The  Works  of  Canova. 

It  awakens  the  same  feeling  when  we  look  at  Can- 
ova's  "Washington"  sitting  as  a  Greek  hero.  The 
Stuttgart  professor,  Dr.  Liibke,  justly  says  that  men 
of  our  time  should  wear  our  garb  and  not  an  antique. 
They  should  in  marble  appear  in  the  form  and  attire 
in  which  they  have  moved  before  in. 

The  "Graces"  of  Canova  are  praised  by  those  who 
delight  in  naked,  languishing  female  beauty,  but 
they  cannot  be  expected  to  command  general  admira- 
tion. Tastes  divide  here.  Some  statues  secure  almost 
unanimous  applause,  for  "they  denote  a  foregone 
conclusion,"  as  some  one  has  said  of  the  pictures  of 
Nicolas  Poussin,  "the  Milton  of  painters,"  as  Hazlitt 
regarded  him.  Every  one  is  charmed,  excepting  now 
and  then  an  imbecile,  such  as  strayed  into  the  British 
Museum  one  day.  Seeing  the  interest  that  the  re- 
mains of  tte  Greek  Parthenon  were  exciting  in  the 
minds  of  beholders,  he  ventured  to  ask  a  gentleman 
what  there  was  remarkable  in  those  marbles.  The 
enraptured  admirer  of  the  Elgin  marbles,  as  if  uncon- 
scious of  the  interruption,  and  only  thinking  aloud- 
exclaimed  ' '  Lifelike ! "  "  Lifelike— well— what— of 
that?"  drawled  out  the  booby  in  broadcloth.  The 
goddess  Vesta  was  once  saved  by  the  braying  of  an 
ass,  and  so,  for  a  long  time,  that  animal  was  solemnly 
crowned  by  the  Komans.  These  long-eared  critics 
are  still  at  large,  and  the  voice  of  their  braying  is 
heard  in  the  land.  It  is  needless  to  say,  as  did 
Deborah,  "Speak!  ye  that  ride  on  white  asses,  ye 


His  Popularity.  165 

that  sit  in  judgment,"  for  they  give  their  unasked 
criticisms.  We  are  forced  to  stay  their  noise,  as 
King  Charles  stayed  the  loud  voice  of  a  donkey  that 
suddenly  broke  in  upon  the  speech  of  the  Mayor  of 
Rochester,  ' '  One  at  a  time !  one  at  a  time,  gentle- 
men!" 

We  were  saying  that  some  works  of  art  denote  a 
"foregone  conclusion."  To  see  them  is  to  admire 
them.  There  is  no  dissonance  of  criticism,  at  least 
among  those  of  ordinary  intelligence.  The  consensus 
of  feeling  is  marked.  This  is  an  irritating  fact  to 
meet.  Ruskin  has  encountered  such  a  judgment  of 
the  works  of  Canova  on  the  part  of  the  educated 
English  of  the  present  century.  He  says  that  "the 
admiration  of  Canova  is  one  of  the  most  deadly 
symptoms  of  the  civilization  of  the  upper  classes." 
Here  we  have  the  opinion  of  the  critic  versus  that  of 
the  community.  He  is  entitled  to  his,  and  they  to 
theirs.  But  we  recall  Hilliard's  remark,  "Art  can- 
not endure  a  commentary.  It  must  be  its  own 
interpreter  or  else  it  cannot  be  understood."  Least 
of  all,  we  may  add,  can  it  endure  a  prejudiced  com- 
mentator, who  seems  to  dwell  on  the  blemish  and 
ignore  the  beauty,  indulging  sometimes  in  a  severity 
that  is  libelous.  Judgment  went  against  Ruskin  in 
1878,  when,  in  an  English  court,  he  was  fined,  though 
but  a  farthing,  for  abusing  Whistler's  "Nocturnes," 
in  these  words,  "I  never  expected  to  hear  a  coxcomb 
ask  200  guineas  for  flinging  a  pot  of  paint  in  the  pub- 


166  The  Works  of  Canova 

lie's  face."  Such  bitterness  is  apt  to  be  proof  of  weak- 
ness, and  hurts  the  critic  far  more  than  the  artist. 

Eaton  says  that  Canova  regarded  his  statue  of  the 
Princess  Borghese  as  one  of  his  best  works.  The 
prince  allowed  few  to  look  upon  it,  being  more  jeal- 
ous of  the  statue  of  his  wife  than  of  her  own  person. 
He  kept  the  marble  locked  up  in  the  palace,  and  he 
alone  held  the  key  of  the  apartment.  The  sculptor 
Chantry  was  admitted  one  night  to  see  it  and  held 
the  taper  so  as  to  best  bring  out  the  beauties  of  the 
figure.  This  incident  suggested  the  lines  of  Moore: 

"When  he,  thy  peer  in  art  and  fame, 

Hung  o'er  the  marble  with  delight, 
And  while  his  lingering  hand  would  steal 

O'er  every  grace  the  taper's  rays, 
Gave  thee,  with  all  the  generous  zeal 

Such  master  spirits  only  feel, 

The  best  of  fame,  a  rival's  praise ! " 

It  has  been  called  a  miracle  of  manipulation  in  its 
exquisite  finish.  It  also  has  a  history  which  invests 
it  with  a  still  higher  value,  even,  than  it  has  as  a 
work  of  art. 

The  kneeling  figure  of  Pius  VI.  at  St.  Peter's  has  a 
purer  sentiment,  and  that  of  Clement  XIII. ,  already 
noticed,  is  called  by  Hare  the  greatest  work  ever 
executed  by  Canova.  Forsyth  pronounces  the  lions 
ki  unrivalled,"  and  he  is  not  one  who  is  lavish  in  praise, 
or  in  any  such  danger  as  Sidney  Smith  said  Gifford 
was  in,  so  generously  distributing  reputation  as  to 
leave  no  reputation  to  himself  as  a  judge.  Forsyth 


Mausoleum  of  Christina.  167 

was  not  a  blind  optimist,  but  rather  sharp  and  severe, 
at  times.  He  said  of  Canova,  "  He  draws  beauty  even 
from  expedients  and  throws  mind  into  every  trifle." 
The  group  of  English  kings  under  the  dome  of  St. 
Peters  is  well  termed  by  Lord  Mahon  "a  stately 
monument"  before  which  one  may  stand  meditating 
"in  thoughtful  silence  on  the  mockery  of  human 
greatness  and  the  last  record  of  ruined  hopes." 

Higher  than  either  of  these  works,  however,  we 
may  place  the  Mausoleum  at  Vienna,  in  the  church 
of  the  Augustines,  in  memory  of  Christina.  "That 
excessively  clever  carver,  Canova,"  as  a  recent  maga- 
zine patronizingly  calls  him — has  presented  here  not 
only  an  elaborate  but  unique  and  meritorious  work 
It  is  wrought  in  greyish  marble  and  in  a  pyramidal 
form.  There  are  two  groups  at  the  base,  embracing 
seven  figures  besides  a  crouching  lion,  a  favorite 
custodian  of  tombs.  An  allegorical  figure  of  Virtue 
is  represented  as  a  noble  matron  bearing  a  funeral 
urn.  She  is  followed  by  female  attendants  and  by 
Beneficence,  another  queenly  form,  with  a  blind  and 
feeble  old  man  clinging  to  her,  and  a  little  girl,  hold- 
ing folded  hands  to  praying  lips.  These  all  are  delin- 
eated with  marvellous  pathos  and  delicacy  of  feeling, 
not  less  than  with  historic  fidelity,  as  all  admit  who 
recall  the  sweet  humanities  illustrated  by  the  Duchess. 
The  details  of  this  work  are  harmonious  and  vividly 
suggestive,  as  seen,  for  example,  in  the  loosened  and 
dishevelled  tresses  of  the  females,  indicative  of  grief, 


168  The  Works  of  Canova. 

their  simple  unstudied  attire,  the  torches  they  carry 
to  illume  the  shadowy  portals,  the  attitude  and  ex- 
pression of  each  figure.  The  genius  of  the  place  sits 
leaning  against  the  lion,  looking  with  pensive  and 
sympathetic  gaze  at  the  procession,  while  his  right 
hand  guards  the  shield  of  the  House  of  Saxony. 
Above  the  door  is  held  a  medallion  of  Christina  in  the 
hands  of  Felicity.  It  is  encircled  by  the  emblem  of 
eternity,  and  a  winged  cherub  bears  a  palm  of  victory. 
The  poetic  sensibility  of  Canova's  nature  and  the 
chivalric  sympathy  he  had  with  that  which  was  pure 
and  noble  have  ample  scope  in  the  composition  and 
execution  of  this  celebrated  piece  of  sculpture. 

The  genius  of  Canova  is  also  shown  in  the  field  of 
historical  composition.  "Socrates  and  his  Judges" 
is  an  illustration.  This  basso  relievo  contains  about 
a  score  of  figures.  The  Athenian  sage  confronts  his 
accusers  and  denies  that  he  has  questioned  the  exist- 
ence of  the  gods.  His  right  hand  and  his  eyes  are 
lifted  heavenward.  His  left  hand  lies  on  his  breast, 
half  concealed  by  his  mantle.  Plato  stands  behind  in 
serene  majesty,  erect  and  unmoved,  but  Xenophon 
bends  forward  with  something  of  sullen  wrath  in  his 
eye,  as  if  he  would  like  to  try  weightier  arguments 
than  words.  Alcibiades  hardly  carries  himself  with 
the  martial  prowess  we  should  expect,  and  his  face 
is  too  feminine  for  a  soldier.  The  faces  of  the 
judges  show  no  mercy,  but  Anytus,  one  of  the 
accusers,  seems  to  be  abashed  before  the  challenge 


The  Nude  in  Art.  169 

of    Socrates,   and   is   about  drawing   the  tapestry 
across  his  face. 

A  more  joyous  scene  is  described  in  another  fine 
basso  relievo  called  the  "Return  of  Telemachus." 
The  "Death  of  Priam"  is  full  of  the  tragic  element, 
even  to  the  verge  of  sensationalism.  The  gesticula- 
tions of  the  terrified  females,  the  prone,  limp  body  of 
the  dead  Polytes  and  the  crouching  figures  of  the 
fugitives,  flying  from  the  palace,  are  presented  with 
ghastly  and  appalling  fidelity,  not  unlike  some  of  the 
figures  in  Michael  Angelo's  "Last  Judgment."  The 
anatomical  accuracy  of  this  and  other  groups  is 
noticeable,  and  yet  not  offensively  prominent,  as  in 
some  of  Angelo's  works.  Like  Da  Vinci,  the  inventor 
of  iconographic  anatomy,  Canova  subordinated  de- 
tails to  the  conventional  and  theoretic.  During  the 
authentic  historic  period  of  Greek  art  the  dissection 
of  the  human  body  was  forbidden  by  the  Roman 
government.  This  is  a  necessary  part  of  the  study 
of  a  physiologist  or  a  surgeon,  but  its  importance  to 
the  artist  has  been  greatly  overestimated.  Why  seek 
the  living  among  the  dead  ? 

As  to  the  nude  in  art,  also,  the  writer  believes  that 
it  has  reached  its  limit.  Whatever  may  have  been 
its  value  in  the  days  of  Canova,  or  Angelo,  or  Praxi- 
teles, in  Italy  or  Greece  the  unveiled  figure  is  rarely 
to  be  chosen  to-day  among  us.  The  author  of  "  Marble 
Faun"  says  that  these  unclothed  bodies,  male  and 
female,  not  only  now  awaken  shame,  but  weary  an 


170  The  Works  of  Canova. 

eye  of  taste.  Greek  sculptors  made  nude  statues 
"modest  as  violets  and  sufficiently  draped  in  their 
own  beauty,"  but  the  modern  sculptor  cannot  work 
with  a  pure  heart,  he  says,  for  he  must  gaze  on  hired 
models,  and  "  the  marble  inevitably  loses  its  chastity 
under  such  circumstances."  "To  the  pure  all  things 
are  pure,"  but  men  are  not  pure,  and  that  is  just  the 
trouble.  Art  nowadays  not  only  incidentally  but 
purposely  ministers  to  lust,  as  photograph,  painting 
and  picture  prove,  as  well  as  the  confessions  of  many 
who  have  been  depraved  with  this  form  of  seductive 
art.(4>  The  present  is  a  formative  period  in  this  land. 
Materialistic  influences  debase  our  tastes.  Purity 
and  refinement  are  lacking.  We  need  not  paint  as 
dark  a  picture  as  Jarves,  who  seems  to  imitate  Ruskin 
in  exaggeration,  and  say  that  "  in  America  the  pre- 
sent is  an  epoch  of  monstrous  plaster  figures  daubed 
with  crazy  paint ;  of  shoddy  portrait  statues  and  in  - 
sane  ideal  ones ;  of  ornaments,  pictures  and  sculpture 
made  to  gull  and  sell ;  of  rude,  though  not  unkindly 
manners  and  speech;  lakes  of  tobacco-spittle  and 
heels  higher  than  heads,  where  ladies  pass  ;  of  pollut- 
ing the  balmiest  airs  of  heaven  with  fumes  of  filthy 
pipes,  and  of  the  thousand  and  one  sins  of  commission 
by  the  selfish  and  thoughtless  that  make  life  tenfold 
less  enjoyable  than  it  needs  be."  We  do  not  overlook 
the  brighter  side  of  the  picture,  the  nameless  and 
numberless  influences  for  good  which  are  at  work  to 
counteract  these  erotic  and  erratic  elements  in  art 


Purity  of  Thought.  171 

and  vulgarity  in  manners.  Still,  there  is  a  time  for 
stern  reproof  and  alarm.  "  The  sentinel  is  not  to  sleep 
at  his  post,"  and  the  complaining  critics  we  have 
quoted  are  not  altogether  wrong.  Refinement  of 
taste  is  absolutely  essential,  not  only  to  the  creation 
of  new  works  of  art,  but  to  the  enjoyment  of  those  of 
earlier  days.  Christian  art  once  shared  the  disgrace 
of  paganism,  and  it  is  now  our  province  to  release  it 
again  from  the  debasing  influences  of  a  sordid  civiliza- 
tion. As  Homer  was  the  Bible  of  ancient  art,  and 
Dante  of  medieval,  the  guide  and  guard  of  Culture 
to-day — of  which  art  is  one  form  of  expression- 
should  be  the  gospel  of  Jesus  Christ.  This  motto 
should  be  written  over  the  studio  of  the  painter  and 
sculptor  as  the  law  and  the  inspiration  of  their  work, 
"Whatsoever  things  are  true,  whatsoever  things  are 
honest,  whatsoever  things  are  just,  whatsoever  things 
are  PURE,  whatsoever  things  are  lovely,  whatsoever 
things  are  of  good  report;  if  there  be  any  virtue, 
if  there  be  any  praise,  THINK  on  these  things."- 
Philippians  4,  8. 

Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  says  that  oftentimes  a  single 
essay  by  an  artist  may  be  of  more  value  to  us  in  prac- 
tical information  than  a  thousand  volumes  of  theory. 
We  cannot  take  our  leave  of  Canova  and  his  works 
without  listening  for  a  moment  to  his  own  ideas  of  the 
sculptor's  vocation,  the  spirit  which  animated,  and 
the  method  which  directed  him,  as  expressed  in  his 
own  language.  We  shall  then  be  the  better  prepared 


172  The  Works  of  Canova. 

to  test  the  correctness  of  our  views  of  him  and  to 
judge  of  the  true  place  to  which  he  is  to  be  assigned 
among  the  world's  great  masters.  Listen  to  these 
words:  "Art,  being  the  minister  of  virtue,  of  beauty 
and  ideal  excellence,  should  always  ennoble  its  sub- 
jects. How  unworthy  are  they  to  be  called  true 
artists  who,  slighting  the  true  purposes  of  art,  are 
content  to  take  low  and  imperfect  models  for  imita- 
tion." As  poetry  chooses  not  only  words  proper  and 
perspicuous,  but  choice  and  felicitous,  so,  says  Canova, 
the  sculptor  should  only  create  those  forms  that  ex- 
press grace  and  nobleness ;  "  objects,  in  short,  that 
are  at  once  rare,  true  and  beautiful."  As  one  can 
always  trust  his  own  judgment  in  all  things,  Canova 
recommends  his  pupils  or  associates  to  avail  them- 
selves of  the  criticisms  of  others,  and  cites  the  example 
of  Phidias,  who  hid  himself  in  the  temple  to  hear  the 
opinions  which  his  Olympian  Jupiter  elicited,  and 
then  reconsidered  his  work  agreeable  to  public  taste. 
Canova  acted  on  this  principle  himself,  and,  disguised 
as  a  ragged  monk,  entered  St.  Peter's  with  the  crowd 
that  came  to  see  his  "  Clement  XIII."  when  first  un_ 
veiled.  He  was  undiscovered.  The  very  prince  who 
had  ordered  the  work  did  not  recognize  him,  but, 
thinking  him  a  bold  beggar,  put  him  one  side  and 
told  him  to  keep  at  a  distance. 

"There  is  one  noble  means  of  avenging  ourselves 
for  unjust  criticism;  it  is  by  doing  still  better  and 
silencing  it  solely  by  the  increasing  excellence  of  our 


Personal  Character.  173 

works.  If  you  undertake  to  dispute,  to  defend,  or  to 
criticise,  by  way  of  reprisal,  you  involve  yourself  in 
endless  troubles  and  disquietudes ;  disturb  that  tran- 
quility  which  is  so  necessary  to  the  successful  exer- 
cise of  your  pursuit,  and  waste  in  harassing  contests 
that  precious  time  which  you  should  consecrate  to 
your  art." 

The  good  sense  and  candor  reflected  in  these  utter- 
ances commend  them  to  the  thoughtful  regard  of  per- 
sons in  every  calling.  They  also  give  us  an  exalted 
idea  of  the  moral  excellence  of  the  man  who  ex- 
pressed them.  Canova  touches  a  vital  theme  when 
he  speaks  of  personal  character  of  the  artist  as  re- 
vealed in  his  works.  He  shows  himself  fully  in  ac- 
cord with  that  canon  of  art  contained  in  the  verse  of 
a  sweet  singer: 

"1Tis  first  the  good  and  then  the  beautiful, 
Not  first  the  beautiful  and  then  the  good, 

First  the  rough  seed  sown  in  the  rougher  soil, 
Then  the  flower  blossom  or  the  branching  wood." 

It  was  Akenside  who  said  that  true  beauty  came 
from  heaven  as  a  priestess  of  truth  in  this  dark  world, 

"For  Truth  and  God  are  one, 
And  Beauty  dwells  in  them  and  they  in  her 
With  like  participation." 

Lady  Eastlake  speaks  of  the  "sculptured  grandeur" 
of  Handel's  music  as  a  fit  channel  of  God's  thought 
to  men,  and  in  sublime  majesty  unrivalled  by  any- 
thing ever  heard  in  human  flesh.  But  it  was  the 
devotional  character  and  not  the  mere  musical  skill 


174  The  Works  of  Canova. 

of  Handel  that  gave  the  world  the  "Messiah."  He 
wept  and  prayed  as  he  composed.  So  Haydn  wrote 
over  his  "Creation"  "Soli  Deo  Gloria,"  and  at  the 
end  "Laus  Deo";  meanwhile,  he  says,  "praying  to 
God  with  earnestness  that  He  would  enable  me  to 
praise  Him  worthily."  The  sculptor,  as  truly  as  the 
poet  or  musician,  is  the  historian  and  interpreter  of 
life.  As  his  own  character  is  rich,  ample,  full  and 
symmetrical,  responsive  to  the  good,  the  beautiful 
and  true ;  he  speaks  to  our  deepest  sensibilities  and 
makes  the  speechless  marble  eloquent  with  unspoken 
thought. 

Referring  to  the  character  of  the  artist,  Canova 
says,  "  Purity  of  heart  and  ingenuousness  of  mind 
have  a  great  influence  to  ennoble  the  conception  of 
the  artist,  and  even  his  style  and  powers  of  execu- 
tion. Impurity  never  can  be  really  beautiful.  I  my- 
self detest  all  immodest  subjects  and  think  that  an 
artist  never  should  sully  his  mind  by  treating  such. 
If  you  are  unable  to  give  to  nudity  itself  an  air  of 
perfect  modesty,  quit  the  fine  arts  by  all  means  for 
some  other  pursuit !" 

He  condemns  severely  the  habits  of  dissipation  into 
which  some  sculptors  have  fallen,  late  hours,  the 
dance  and  the  debauch,  and  says  that  he  pities  them 
in  their  vain  attempt  to  unite  a  life  of  amusement 
with  the  work  of  a  noble  profession.  Mediocrity  or 
failure  will  be  the  sure  result.  On  the  other  hand, 
zeal  without  discretion  is  fruitless."  Mere  enthusiasm 


Working  Methods.  175 

and  warmth  of  fancy  are  little  better  than  delirium, 
unless  joined  with  soundness  of  judgment  and  fine 
powers  of  execution.  The  judgment  is  to  be  satisfied 
only  by  what  is  just  and  true,  and  the  heart  by  the 
fine  expression  of  natural  feelings. 

First  of  all,  in  chiselling  a  statue,  he  began  with  and 
finished  the  head  before  the  other  parts,  that  he  might 
be  inspired,  "  enamoured"  with  it,  otherwise  the  three 
or  four  months'  intercourse  with  the  subject  would  be 
"work  against  the  grain."  "I  have  always  found  it 
necessary  to  imagine  as  lovely  a  face  as  I  possibly 
can  in  order  that  I  may  proceed  with  spirit  and  devo- 
tion to  the  rest  of  the  work.  I  say  within  myself, 
'this  lovely  face  ought  to  have  every  other  part  beau- 
tiful to  correspond  with  it ;  the  attitude  must  be  beau- 
tiful ;  she  must  also  be  clothed  and  adorned  suitably 
with  her  beauty/  and  thus  the  first  idea  guides  and 
inspires  me  throughout  the  work.  This  is  science 
which  is,  I  think,  founded  on  the  human  heart." 

Whatever  diversity  of  opinions  existed  as  to  the 
comparative  excellence  of  his  works,  wrought  out  on 
the  principles  thus  stated,  all  the  contemporaries  of 
Canova  were  ready  to  admit  the  sincerity  of  his  pur- 
pose and  the  purity  of  his  life.  When  he  passed 
away,  we  are  told  that  throughout  Italy  was  heard 
the  ejaculation  "uttered  by  every  one  with  the  deep- 
est emotion,  'The  good  Canova  is  dead !'"'  The  vir- 
tues he  commended  to  others  he  had  practiced  him- 
self. His  chisel  had  wrought  on  marble  and  his  life 


176  The  Works  of  Canova. 

had  wrought  on  men.  Hence  these  tears.  His  "works" 
followed  him.  His  memory  has  lived  in  grateful 
hearts,  for  he  who  had  never  known  domestic  joys, 
who  had  lived  a  simple,  frugal,  single  life,  made  many 
homes  bright  with  his  princely  bounty.  All  through 
one  winter's  famine  he  fed  the  poor  of  his  native 
Venetian  village  from  his  own  private  purse.  To 
the  father  of  another  starving  household  he  offered 
four  hundred  scudi,  $500,  not  as  a  gift — f or  the  man 
was  a  painter,  poor  in  merit  as  in  money,  and  as 
proud  as  he  was  poor — but  as  a  nominal  sum  for  a 
picture  ordered  by  Canova,  to  save  the  man's  self 
respect. 

These  memorabilia  might  be  multiplied  to  show 
that  Canova's  ideas  of  personal  character  as  related 
to  the  aims  of  art  were  not  visionary,  theoretical  and 
unpractical,  but  were  realized  in  his  own  life  of  five 
and  sixty  years. 

It  has  been  the  aim  of  this  thesis  not  only  to  char- 
acterize the  features  of  Canova's  works,  but  to  show 
some  of  the  principles  which  were  their  inspiration 
and  their  guide.  With  respect  to  a  final  judgment 
as  to  the  place  he  justly  occupies  as  a  sculptor,  little 
need  be  said  in  addition. 

The  high  position  to  which  the  educated  classes  of 
England  have  raised  him  has  been  referred  to  in  the 
remark  quoted  from  Ruskin.  In  the  present  survey 
we  have  not  hidden  the  faults  that  are  apparent,  but 
have  chosen  to  attribute  them  largely  to  the  vicious 


His  True  Position.  177 

influences  in  that  period  of  art,  out  of  which  Canova's 
age  was  coming  and  against  which  he  nobly  strove. 
Estimated  by  the  standard  of  perfection  to  which 
Hudson  brings  Shakespeare,  "Solidarity, Originality, 
Completeness  and  Disinterestedness,"  in  other  words, 
organic  unity,  individuality,  truthfulness  and  self- 
forgetfulness,  the  Italian  in  his  art  would  sink  below 
the  bard  of  Avon  in  his.  But  judged  by  the  times  in 
which  he  wrought,  and  by  the  general  atmosphere  of 
grace  and  beauty  that  envelope  his  works,  we  are 
constrained  to  give  him  a  high  place  among  the 
artists  of  the  world.  Not  only  do  his  productions 
command  our  admiration,  but  the  ideal  he  presented. 
No  one  was  more  painfully  sensible  than  himself  of 
the  fact  that  that  ideal  was  unreached,  but  the  whole- 
some spirit  it  imparted  may  well  be  commended  to 
the  attention  of  some  who  style  themselves  founders 
of  modern  sestheticism,  "a  compound  of  fatalism, 
pantheism  and  pessimism,  the  prevailing  material- 
ism or  'dirt  philosophy'  of  the  day.  Life  is  reduced 
to  a  serio-comic  farce,  or  an  utterly  cheerless  struggle 
for  profitless  objects ;  the  world  is  either  a  playground 
for  thoughtless  merriment,  or  a  theater  for  lawless 
riot."  From  such  a  "  Renaissance,"  Good  Lord  deliver 
us! 

It  was  only  in  this  19th  century  that  Baumgarten 
gave  men  the  word  "^Esthetics,"  though  the  science 
of  the  beautiful  had  been  studied  from  the  times  of 
Plato  to  those  of  Cousin.  Now,  men  of  the  Swine- 


178  The  Works  of    Canova. 

burne  sta'mp,  or  disciples  of  Oscar  Wilde,  have  chris- 
tened their  insipid  yet  poisonous  teachings  on  art 
"Modern  JEstheticism,"  a  euphemism  that  illustrates 
what  Archbishop  Trench  terms  "  degeneracy  of  words." 
Over  against  their  twaddle  about  beauty  it  is  refresh- 
ing to  set  the  sentences  quoted  from  Canova,  extol- 
ling purity  of  heart  and  nobility  of  aim  as  prerequi- 
sites in  any  department  of  the  fine  arts. 

A  study  of  the  life  and  times  of  this  eminent  Italian 
sculptor  is  an  alluring  and  remunerative  exercise. 
Guided  by  the  canons  of  criticism  already  stated, 
with  an  eye  open  to  his  excellencies  as  well  as  to  his 
defects,  to  his  purpose  as  well  as  to  its  realization, 
we  cannot  fail  to  see  the  value  of  the  work  he  accom- 
plished, or  hesitate  to  concede  to  him  the  exalted 
position  which  he  fairly  won.  High  on  the  roll  of 
those  who,  from  the  earliest  centuries  till  now  have 
adorned  and  enriched  the  temple  of  Beauty  by  their 
imperishable  productions,  the  impartial  historian  of 
art  will  write  the  name  of  ANTONIO  CANOVA. 

NOTE  1.— Of  Polybius,  Anthon  says  a  history  has  never  been  writ- 
ten by  a  man  of  more  good  sense,  perspicacity,  sounder  judgment  or 
more  free  from  all  manner  of  prejudices,"  while  Tacitus  is  called  the 
"Father  of  Philosophical  History. " 

2.—  Roubiliac  used  linen  dipped  in  warm  starch  water.  When  the 
shape  pleased  him  he  left  it  to  diy.  Like  Canova  he  polished  the  sur- 
face of  the  marble  to  a  waxen  smoothness  to  prevent  stains,  which  do 
not  easily  penetrate  a  glossy  surface.  Chantry  says  that  Roubiliac  exe- 
cuted "the  noblest  of  all  English  statues  "—that  of  Sir  Isaac  Newton, 


Notes.  179 

and  that  he  cherished  a  most  hearty  regard  for  merit  in  others.  Stand- 
ing before  the  canopy  which  surrounds  the  figure  of  Sir  Francis  Vere 
in  Westminster  Abbey,  lost  in  admiration,  he  was  accosted  by  a  friend. 
Laying  his  hand  on  his  friend's  arm,  Roubiliac,  entranced,  exclaimed, 
pointing  to  the  figure,  "Hush  !  he  will  speak  soon ! " 

3. — The  icy  gloss  gives  one  a  chill  that  the  ordinary  marble  does  not. 
Of  the  drapery  of  "Handel"  by  Roubiliac,  "Every  button  seems  to 
have  set  for  its  likeness."  When  we  see  Albert  Durer's  angel  in 
flounced  petticoats  driving  the  naked  pair  from  Paradise,  or  Cigoli's 
"Simeon "with  modern  spectacles  astride  his  nose,  we  cannot  but 
smile. 

4.— In  Wuttke's  "Christian  Ethics"  we  read  that  it  is  a  false  notion 
that  clothing  conceals  beauty.  It  heightens  it  when  it  expresses  the 
spiritual.  A  bathing  place,  he  says,  with  naked  bathers,  though  each 
be  an  Apollo,  would  not  be  a  beautiful  spectacle.  Why  exhibit  in  the 
gallery,  or  before  the  footlights,  what  would  shame  ua  elsewhere? 
Mendelssohn  would  not  prostitute  his  art  to  the  service  of  vice.  He 
writes  of  a  certain  opera.  "In  this  opera  a  young  girl  divests  herself 
of  her  garments  and  sings  a  song  to  the  eff ect  that  she  wfll  be  married 
the  next  day.  /  have  no  music  for  such  things  !  I  consider  it  ignoble  !  " 
If  all  painters,  sculptors  and  musicians  took  this  ground,  cleaner  work 
would  be  done  in  all  departments  of  art.  A  successful  play-writer— of 
whom  Augustus  Daly  says  that  he  "has  most  distinctively  portrayed 
American  life  in  the  drama,"  says  in  Harper's  Weekly: 

"Within  the  memory  of  theater-goers,  the  nude  was  almost  un- 
known, and  anything  savoring  of  immorality  was  tabooed.  At  present 
no  light  opera  or  spectacular  performance  can  be  a  success  without  a 
superabundant  display  of  corporeal  charms,  and  the  number  of  plays 
whose  corner  stones  are  unchastity  and  vice,  is  constantly  on  the 
increase." 


180 

SUPPLEMENTARY  NOTE. — "The  "Works  of  Canova,"  with  three  other 
papers,  " Windows  of  Character,"  "The  Works  of  Landseer''  and 
"Rome  an  Art  Center,"  were  read  in  a  course  of  Lectures  given  by 
the  author  in  New  York  city,  at  the  close  of  which  the  following 
resolution — presented  by  PROFESSOR  W.  C.  JARVIS,  M.D.  of  New 
York  University,  was  adopted  : 

' '  Having  listened  to  the  Lectures  of  DR.  THWING  on  Art  and  Char- 
acter for  the  past  month  with  vivid  and  increasing  interest,  week  by 
week,  we  desire  to  record  our  grateful  appreciation  of  these  lectures — 
scholarly  in  statement  and  delivered  in  a  most  engaging  style— and 
also  to  express  the  hope  that  they  may  find  a  wider  audience  and  a 
permanent  place,  ere  long,  in  a  printed  form. " 

Some  of  the  scientific  essays  of  this  volume,  read  from  advance 
sheets,  have  elicited  kindly  criticism  from  eminent  writers.  REV.  DR. 
CHARLES  F.  THWING  of  Minneapolis,  expresses  his  warm  approval, 
and  adds,  "The  author  is  working  along  a  line  of  greatest  promise  for 
the  reformation  and  regeneration  of  fallen  humanity." 

REV.  DR.  E.  PAYSON  INGERSOLL  of  Brooklyn,  an  honored  member  of 
the  Cleveland  Bar  before  he  entered  the  pulpit,  writes  :  "I  have  read 
PSYCHOLOGICAL  STUDIES  AND  MENTAL  AUTOMATISM  with  profound 
admiration.  DR.  THWING  's  work  is  really  grand.  There  is  constant 
evidence  of  scholarly  investigation.  There  is  also  graphic  reasoning. 
His  sentences  are  bright  and  ongoing.  Beyond  this,  he  convinces  as 
well  as  pleases. " 

The  Essay  which  was  read  before  the  Medico-Legal  Society  received 
"Honorable  Mention  "  from  the  Committee  on  Prizes,  and  appears  in 
the  Transactions  of  the  Society,  also,  in  a  separate  volume  issued  by 
the  Society.  Orders  for  the  same  may  be  addressed  to  the  Author, 
loG  St.  Mark's  Avenue,  Brooklyn,  N.  Y. 


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